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kiruuuuu · 5 years

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Siege the Day: Day 7

Hello all 💖 This is my entry for @dualrainbow‘s fantastic Siege the Day language event!! Thank you to everyone who helped make this possible and I hope the three, four German people in the fandom enjoy this piece :) (German Montagne/Bandit in which Bandit is convinced he’s ill, Rating T, fluff, ~2.3k words)

Despite having written in German for almost my entire life, this felt extremely odd to me as I’d not written anything for Siege in German - I kept thinking of English phrases which I tried to translate into German and it was a real mess :D If anyone’s interested, I can try to translate it!

„Dom.“ Auf das Klopfen hin hebt sich Docs Kopf, Augenbrauen in Überraschung hochgezogen. „Komm rein. Dich sieht man hier nicht häufig.“

Bandit verzieht das Gesicht und kämpft den Drang nieder, sich verlegen am Hinterkopf zu kratzen dafür, ihren exzellent ausgebildeten Arzt mit einer derartigen Lappalie zu behelligen. „Ich weiß, dass ich ständig herkomme und du beschäftigt bist, aber -“ Ein ungläubiger Blick lässt ihn mitten im Satz verstummen. „Oh. Du meintest es ernst.“

„Meinte ich, ja.“ Doc wartet, bis er eingetreten ist und die Tür hinter sich geschlossen hat, ehe er fortfährt: „Und wann, ungefähr, hat sich diese Unfähigkeit, Sarkasmus zu identifizieren, eingestellt?“

„Was?“ Ein weiterer Blick, der Bandit entscheidend zu viel Blut in die Wangen treibt. Nicht zum ersten Mal hinkt sein Gehirn hinterher, noch vor einer Stunde musste er sich Jägers Spott aussetzen, nachdem er gedankenverloren sein Handy suchte – mithilfe der Taschenlampe in seinem Handy. Fürchterlich. Er hat einen Ruf zu verlieren, und so, wie er sich gerade anstellt, wird ihm dies besorgniserregend leicht fallen. „Deshalb bin ich hier. Nicht nur deswegen, aber Konzentrationsschwierigkeiten gehören dazu.“

Docs Miene wechselt zu jener professionellen, die Bandit unmissverständlich klar macht, dass ab nun Scherze unangebracht sind. „Du wärst nicht hier, wenn es nicht ernst wäre. Schieß los. Welche anderen Beschwerden hast du?“

Und genau dort liegt der Hund begraben. Denn Bandits Symptome sind nicht sonderlich beeindruckend, weshalb er lange mit sich haderte, ehe er Doc schlussendlich aufsuchte. Es ist beinahe peinlich. „Ich habe Schlafschwierigkeiten“, gibt er zögernd zu.

„Wie ernst? Haben sich deine Alpträume verschlimmert?“

„Nein, der Rest ist gleich geblieben. Es dauert nur länger, bis ich einschlafe.“ Doc nickt aufmunternd, damit er mit seiner Liste fortfährt. „Appetitlosigkeit gehört auch dazu.“

„Dauerhaft?“

„Nein, zwischendurch. Vor allem hier, in der Basis, manchmal zuhause. An Wochenenden ist es in Ordnung.“

„Verstehe. Weiter.“

„Mir ist häufig schwindlig.“

„Kreislauf?“

„Nein, einfach so. Auch häufig hier.“ So langsam beginnt Bandits Scham gegen die Unannehmlichkeiten zu gewinnen. „Weißt du was, vergiss es, ich hätte nicht -“

Doc fällt ihm ins Wort und Bandit könnte nicht sagen, ob der nüchterne Tonfall, mit dem er auf das Gesagte – oder wahrscheinlich eher Implizierte – reagiert, die Konversation mehr oder weniger erträglich macht: „Hast du irgendwelche unerklärlichen Schmerzen? Irgendeine alarmierende Veränderung in deinem Körper? Etwas an deiner Ernährung umgestellt? Vermutest du irgendetwas Ernsteres?“

Bandit nimmt an, dass eine ehrliche Antwort erwartet wird, und so erwidert er wahrheitsgemäß: „Nein. Zu allem.“ Die Tatsache, dass er eine erhöhte Libido aufweist, verschweigt er jedoch. Er hat schon genug von Docs Zeit verplempert.

„Fassen wir zusammen: du bist abgelenkt, schläfst schlecht ein, hast den Großteil der Zeit keinen Hunger und neigst zu Schwindel.“

Nun ja. Wenn er es so formuliert, klingt es nach genau nichts.

„Bist du einsam?“

Was. „Dein Ernst?“ Bandit ist bereits auf halbem Weg zu Docs Schreibtisch sowie zu einer langatmigen, echauffierten Tirade, ehe ihm auffällt, dass diese Symptome tatsächlich… „Es ist keine Depression. Glaub mir. Ich weiß, wie sich der Scheiß anfühlt. In dem Fall wäre ich auf gar keinen Fall hier.“

Docs Blick bohrt sich noch einige Sekunden länger in seinen Schädel, doch Bandit bleibt bei seiner Aussage – Blitz hat ihn oft genug gerügt für die Tatsache, dass Bandit sich eher in den Fuß schießen als um Hilfe bitten würde. „Nun gut. Aber dann kann ich dir kaum helfen. Ich bezweifle, dass du Frühling als Diagnose akzeptierst. Bekommst du genug Vitamin D?“

Nicht mehr, seitdem ich mit zwanglosen One-Night-Stands aufgehört habe, antwortet Bandit in seinem Kopf. Hey, scheint, als sei ihm die Affinität zu Sarkasmus doch nicht vollends abhanden gekommen. „Ich weiß, dass es eigentlich nichts ist, aber ich bin kein Hypochonder. Vorletzte Woche bin ich in eine Tür gelaufen, du erinnerst dich bestimmt. Letzte Woche bin ich beinahe während einer Schießübung zusammengeklappt. Es ist irrelevant, was ich zu essen vor mir habe: im Speisesaal könnte es genauso gut ranzige Butter und faule Eier sein, und zuhause ein Festmahl. Ich habe keinen Bock mehr, in jeder Unterhaltung zehnmal nachzufragen. Irgendetwas stimmt nicht mit mir.“

Sein Nachdruck scheint zu Doc durchzudringen, denn er runzelt nachdenklich die Stirn. „Wir können gerne einige Tests durchführen, aber deine Angaben sind recht vage. Oder du versuchst darauf zu achten, wann welches Symptom auftritt, und berichtest mir in einigen Tagen davon.“

„Ich kann‘s versuchen“, seufzt Bandit, nicht sonderlich ermutigt von Docs eigener Ratlosigkeit.

„Hey, ich hab mal gegoogelt, was es sein könnte, und mehrere Webseiten haben mir versichert, dass es Krebs ist“, informiert Blitz ihn hilfsbereit und lässt sich auf den benachbarten Stuhl fallen.

Seit wann kann man nicht mehr schmollend, niedergeschlagen und asozial mit seinem Handy in der Ecke sitzen und tatsächlich in Ruhe gelassen werden? Bandit hat längst herausgefunden, dass seine Beschwerden sich minimieren, sofern er sich von der Gesellschaft im Allgemeinen und seinen Kollegen im Speziellen fernhält, doch die Umsetzung dieses einfach klingenden Plans stellt sich als ziemlich unmöglich heraus. „Reizend“, grummelt er und versucht, keine Reaktion auf die soeben erhaltenen Fotos von Pitbull-Welpen zu zeigen, allerdings stiehlt sich ein ungebetenes Lächeln auf seine Lippen. Sie sind verdammt süß. Manche Menschen wissen eben ganz genau, wie man Bandit aufmuntert.

„Marius hat schon angekündigt, dein Motorrad lila lackieren zu lassen, wenn er es erbt.“ Und manche sind unerklärlicherweise stolz darauf, dass sie das genaue Gegenteil erreichen.

„Ich weiß noch, wie du felsenfest davon überzeugt warst, die Pest zu haben, bis Werner endlich zugab, dass es Knutschflecken waren. Der alte Suffkopp.“

Blitz schaudert sichtlich, was Bandit nicht vernachlässigbare Genugtuung bereitet. Das nächste Bild ist von einem strahlenden Pitbull auf einer Harley. Bandit versucht, seine Miene des hilflosen Dahinschmelzens durch ein Husten zu tarnen, doch Blitz erhascht einen verhängnisvollen Blick auf sein Display. „Oh nein, wie niedlich! Von wem hast du das?“

„Monty.“ Blitz scheint auf mehr zu warten, also ergänzt Bandit: „Ich sage dir, der Kerl könnte zum Massenmörder werden und trotzdem so verständnisvoll mit dem Teufel umgehen, dass er doch noch im Himmel landet. Religion ist ziemlicher Bockmist, aber wenn es jemals Heilige gegeben hat, dann gehört er dazu.“

„Mein Gott. Du musst wirklich krank sein. War das gerade ein Kompliment?“

Bandit belässt es bei einem angemessenen Augenrollen und richtet seine Aufmerksamkeit wieder seinem Handy zu. Versucht es zumindest.

„Vielleicht wirst du ja einfach alt. Tun dir beim Aufstehen nicht eh schon alle Knochen weh?“

„Du deutest gerade nicht an, dass meine Midlifecrisis sich durch alle möglichen Symptome äußert, oder?“

„Seit wann schlägst du dich denn mit dem Scheiß herum?“

Die Tatsache, dass selbst Blitz von unaufhörlichem Hohn ablässt, um sich ernsthaft mit Bandits ‚Erdbeerwoche‘ (wie er es so lange betitelte, bis Monika ihm die Leviten las) zu beschäftigen, ist in etwa so bedenklich wie Docs aufrichtiges Interesse. Bandit zuckt die Schultern. „Seit einem Monat. Ungefähr.“

„Also seit der Mission in Teheran“, schlussfolgert sein Teamkollege inkorrekt.

„Nein. Ein, zwei Wochen später.“

„…also seit der Mission in Teheran“, wiederholt Blitz unamüsiert und hebt eine Augenbraue, als Bandit seinen Gesichtsausdruck kopiert.

„Glaubst du nicht, dass ich ein eventuelles Trauma früher erkannt hätte?“

„Wir reden schließlich immer noch von dir.“ Das ist fair, so viel muss selbst Bandit zugeben. Er ist nicht bekannt für bahnbrechende Introspektion. „Und immerhin hättest du draufgehen können. Wenn Gilles nicht gewesen wäre.“

„Ist ja auch egal, es hat nichts damit zu tun. Vielleicht esse ich das Falsche. Keine Ahnung.“

„Du könntest ja mal auf Gesünderes umsteigen, ist dir der Gedanke schon mal gekommen? Oder bist du inzwischen bei Kentucky Schreit Ficken eingezogen?“

Und schon sind sie wieder dabei, sich zu streiten. Nicht einmal ein strahlender Pitbull mit einem Entenküken auf dem Kopf kann Bandit ablenken. …zumindest nicht allzu lang.

Nur einen Tag später lässt sich Blitz erneut neben Bandit fallen, als habe er noch nicht ausreichend gepöbelt – und es scheint, als habe er Verstärkung mitgebracht, denn Doc gesellt sich zu ihnen, ungewöhnlich heiter wirkend. „Wir wissen, was du hast“, eröffnet Blitz das Gespräch mit einem überlegenen Tonfall, der Bandit seine Augen verengen lässt.

„Tatsächlich war ich mit meiner Diagnose gar nicht so weit weg“, fügt Doc fröhlich hinzu.

Bandit ist kurz davor, den beiden Grinsekatzen entweder Gewalt anzudrohen (in Form endloser Streiche, natürlich) oder die Unterhaltung gleich ganz sein zu lassen, denn wenn er eines am frühen Morgen nicht ertrug, war es ein selbstgefälliger Blitz – allerdings bemerkt er just in dem Moment die vorbeilaufende Truppe aus Docs Teammitgliedern und kann sich nicht beherrschen. Das Brötchen kollidiert mit einem extrem zufriedenstellenden dumpfen Geräusch mit Rooks Hinterkopf und der junge Mann sowie seine drei Begleiter drehen sich entrüstet zur Quelle des Waffe gewordenen Frühstücks um. „Zwei Minuten zweiunddreißig“, verkündet Bandit stolz und erntet generelle Verwirrung von allen außer Rook selbst.

„Echt? Krass. Hätte nicht gedacht, dass du mich überholst – dann muss ich wohl einen neuen Rekord aufstellen.“ Auf eine kurze Frage von Montagne hin ergänzt Rook: „Wir versuchen, so lang wie möglich die Luft anzuhalten. Gehst du nicht zwischendurch tauchen, Gilles? Dom wollte damit anfangen, deshalb trainiert er.“

Wasserblaue Augen treffen Bandits eigene. Selbst auf die Entfernung ist ihre Farbe bemerkenswert. „Wenn du möchtest, kann ich dich mal mitnehmen.“

Er zuckt halbherzig mit der Schulter. „Klar. Warum nicht?“ Seine Antwort bringt ihm ein Lächeln ein, und aus irgendeinem Grund grinst auch Rook ihm kurz zu, ehe die Truppe weiterzieht.

Dann erst bemerkt Bandit die vielsagenden Blicke der beiden Idioten vor sich. „Was?“

„Nichts“, entgegnet Doc, und Blitz: „Schon okay.“

„Wolltet ihr mir nicht sagen -“

„Ich entschied mich um.“ Blitz stupst den Franzosen neben sich mit dem Ellbogen an und gemeinsam stehen die beiden wieder auf. „Du wirst schon sehr bald merken, dass deine ‚Krankheit‘ nachlässt.“

Bandit kann nur hoffen, dass er Recht behält, denn inzwischen haben sich Herzrasen und Kurzatmigkeit zu seinen restlichen Beschwerden gesellt.

Und während Bandit zugeben muss, dass sich Blitz‘ ominöse Prophezeiung durchaus bewahrheitet hat, so war er nicht auf die Nebenwirkungen vorbereitet: statt Schwindel und dem flauen Gefühl im Bauch leidet er nun unter einem allumfassenden Motivationsloch sowie ironischerweise chronischer Rastlosigkeit – stets hat er den Eindruck, irgendetwas tun zu müssen, auch wenn er sich nicht dazu aufraffen kann. Seine unregelmäßige Appetitlosigkeit ist zu einer ständigen mutiert, dafür hat sich allerdings seine Aufmerksamkeitsspanne verbessert. Es ist ihm nun unangenehm deutlich bewusst, wie viel Zeit tatsächlich in einem einzigen Tag steckt.

Als wäre das alles nicht schon ätzend genug, er ist zudem auch noch fürchterlich reizbar, was zugegebenermaßen kaum einen Unterschied zu seiner normalen Persönlichkeit darstellt, jedoch Grund genug für den Großteil der Verbliebenen ist, einen großen Bogen um ihn zu machen. Manche seiner Kollegen hatten das Glück, auf ein dreiwöchiges Training verschifft zu werden und somit von Bandits langsam umschlagender Laune verschont zu bleiben. Blitz gehört nicht dazu, aber Blitz ist Blitz und so dringt er wie gehabt jeden Tag in Bandits persönliche Blase ein, um ihm mit dämlichen Vorschlägen und Kommentaren auf den Sack zu gehen.

Aus irgendeinem Grund tut er dies noch vergnügter als ohnehin schon. Bandit hegt die Vermutung, dass Blitz selbst für Bandits grottenschlechte Laune verantwortlich ist, aber leider fehlen ihm die Beweise. Die Bemerkung, er wisse ganz genau, was Bandit plage, machte ihn zwar verdächtig, allerdings kann Bandit sich nicht vorstellen, wie sein Freund ihn in mancher Hinsicht kuriert und in anderer verflucht haben sollte. Hatte er irgendwelche Pillen in Bandits Essen gemischt? Seine Kleidung mit irgendeinem Hormon oder Pheromon oder was auch immer eingesprüht? (Bandit weiß nicht so ganz, wie so etwas funktioniert. Und wenn er ehrlich ist, will er es auch gar nicht wissen.)

Was auch immer es war – sollte sich herausstellen, dass Blitz Schuld ist, zündet Bandit eben seine Schuhe an. Oder kramt sein uraltes Juckpulver wieder aus.

Trotz allem ist Blitz eine zuverlässige Quelle für den Rest der Welt, und so stimmt Bandit missmutig zu, ihn bei einigen Erledigungen zu begleiten. Er schreibt es der völligen Leere seiner Notifikationsleiste zu, dass er viel zu spät merkt, wie weit ab vom eigentlichen Weg in die Stadt sie gekommen sind, denn das Fehlen jeglicher Nachrichten frisst schon seit einiger Weile an ihm.

„Wo fahren wir hin?“, fragt er skeptisch und liest einige der vorbeirauschenden Schilder. Flughafen, steht irgendwo angeschlagen, und Blitz biegt tatsächlich ab. Vielleicht macht er Bandit ja das beste Geburtstagsgeschenk, das er je bekommen hat, und geht frühzeitig in Rente?

„Die anderen kommen heute zurück, hast du vergessen?“, antwortet Blitz mit einem honigsüßen Lächeln.

Und oh. Da ist sie wieder, die Schwere in Bandits Magengrube und die Leichtigkeit seines Kopfs. „Ah“, gibt er betont lässig zurück und fragt sich, warum sein Herzschlag sich derart verschnellert hat.

„Ich hole ein paar von ihnen ab. Und du holst Gilles ab.“

Bandit ist sich plötzlich nicht mehr sicher, wofür Sauerstoff benutzt wird, doch dessen Notwendigkeit erschließt sich ihm aufs Neue, nachdem er viel zu lange darauf verzichtet. „Aber -“

„Es war nicht die Mission in Teheran, die dich nicht losgelassen hat“, fährt Blitz ungerührt fort, ohne die Augen von der Straße zu nehmen, „sondern dass du angefangen hast, mehr mit Gilles zu reden.“

Frühling, hatte Doc es genannt. Frühlingsgefühle hätte es besser getroffen. Er wendet den Blick ab, weiß nicht, was er sagen soll.

„Und seitdem er weg ist, sitzt du nur rum wie bestellt und nicht abgeholt und trauerst. Dom, es ist ziemlich offensichtlich.“

Okay. Vielleicht ist er doch nicht krank. Und vielleicht wusste er es irgendwie. Und vielleicht, ganz vielleicht, hatte er gehofft, dass irgendein externer Einfluss ihn dazu zwingt, genau das einzugestehen.

Blitz parkt sein Auto und wendet sich ihm mit einem uncharakteristisch aufrichtigen Strahlen zu. „Terminal 2. Viel Erfolg.“

Die beiden schauen sich einige Sekunden schweigend an, dann schnallt Bandit sich wortlos ab und öffnet die Beifahrertür. Eine Hand auf seinem Arm lässt ihn innehalten.

„Und gute Besserung“, wünscht Blitz ihm mit einem Grinsen, das nicht einmal ironisch aussieht.

Aber was weiß Bandit denn schon. Hoffentlich dauert es nicht mehr lange, bis er Sarkasmus wieder zuverlässig identifizieren kann.

#rainbow six siege #montagne #bandit #montagne/bandit #fanfic #oneshot #in german I tend to not be as crude in language #this is uncharacteristically cutesy for my german stuff #I wanted to shove endless german references in here #but cowered at the prospect of having to explain them all

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abba-enthusiast · 2 years

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Hey I am hoping you can answer this (no pressure of you don't wanna answer).

What is the Swiss public's general opinion on Austria and Germany?

I am just super curious about this. Thank you!

Hiiii, thank you for your question!!

(I can really only speak for the german speaking part of Switzerland, specifically the part near the German border (Nordwestschweiz) because that’s where I live and experiences and opinions might vary)

That being said, the first thing I would like to point out, is that in most cases, I believe Swiss people don’t actually know that much about Germany and Austria (maybe in that regard Germany more so than Austria, just because it's such a big country) and most of our feelings toward these countries tend to be somewhat superficial and/or based solely on the experiences with German/Austrian people living in Switzerland.

I‘m gonna start with Austria, because i think it’s easier:

At least in my experience Austria is very positively regarded in Switzerland. Idk how to explain it but there's a sense of community, camaraderie even... It might be the Alpine (skiing) culture that connects us, or the fact that we both don’t speak the ‚correct‘ german and hence have been victims of many jokes made about us by Germans (I mean sure, we might also make a little fun of the Austrian pronunciation, but just know it comes from a place of admiration and love). In my experience a lot of Swiss people appreciate the Austrian cuisine, culture and the hospitality and generally consider Austrians to be very easy-going and friendly. I think when it comes to the general mentality of the people, Austrians are more similar to Swiss people than Germans are, which makes them more likeable to us.

So overall, I'd say Austria has a pretty good reputation in Switzerland :)

The way Germany and Germans are perceived is a little bit trickier: I mean Germany is obviously a very beautiful country and I'm fairly certain most Swiss people would agree with me on this, but unfortunately, on a very superficial level, Swiss people tend to not regard Germans that highly and I think there are a number of reasons for this:

firstly, compared to Swiss people, Germans just happen to be very direct. („Ich hätte gerne ein Brötchen, bitte“ vs. „Ich krieg ein Brötchen“, you know?) and obviously that’s just cultural differences, but to Swiss people this directness is often interpreted as rudeness or arrogance. Swiss people are extremely reserved and I could imagine that that probably looks to Germans like aversion, which makes them dislike us, which in turn makes us dislike them… so it’s a vicious cycle :/

Secondly, since the 90s, there’s been an influx of German people who come to work in Switzerland and I believe a lot of Swiss people felt (or feel) threatened by that, especially since there is no language barrier (like for example with immigrants from non-german speaking countries), which means that the Germans can get highly qualified jobs. (I might even argue that they have a slight advantage in jobs that require (public) speaking or generally a way with words, because whatever they say will sound so much more sophisticated when compared to somebody speaking standard german with a strong swiss german accent. And Germans have a lot of little phrases that make them sound real intelligent, while Swiss people tend to sound more… crude? Idk). And since there is a considerable amount of very smart Germans who work in Switzerland to get that big buck but still live in Germany where the cost of living is cheaper, there is some resentment from Swiss people who don't think this is fair.

Thirdly, I think the fact that we technically speak the same language, yet still Swiss people often have to switch to Standard German to communicate, accentuates and augments the already existing cultural differences in a rather negative way. Plus, a lot of Swiss people experience a kind of inferiority complex when speaking standard German, and that certainly doesn’t help.

Fourthly, a lot of the time it's more of a Hassliebe when it comes to Germany, because we just like to complain about stuff and hate admitting that something or someone is actually quite nice and might actually be better than us in various ways 👀

HOWEVER. We absolutely don’t hate Germany! I think most of those feelings of ‚resentment‘ are just due to a somewhat superficial understanding of German culture and a feeling of intimidation in regards to our big neighbour lmao.

There’s loads we love and appreciate about Germany! Just to list a (superficial) few:

German cars

Die Autobahn

Billig Einkaufen

Europapark

Bier

Pfandflaschenautomat

Brot/Deutsche Küche allgemein

your incredible dedication to Spargelsaison

all the niche rules you come up with and all the loop-holes you find in regards to those rules

the ability to make paperwork so complicated. it's truly fascinating

And I also think a lot of Swiss people are secretly quite envious of how direct Germans are "allowed" to be, and of how much more friendly/less reserved they are.

Sorry for the essay lmao, this got kinda out of hand but i really really really want to emphasise that we do! not! hate! Germans and Germany! I really think what tends to ‚strain‘ our mutual relationship are the cultural differences - as I said, in the eyes of the Swiss the Germans might seem rude and for the Germans the Swiss might come across as cold and unfriendly. But as soon as these differences are acknowledged, we can really get along quite well <3

In conclusion, I think most Swiss people are rather fond of Austria and Germany :) I hope this answered your question

(Swiss people if you disagree with me or have anything to add, please do!!)

#sorry this turned into a novel lmao but i just don't want people to think we actually hate germany cause we really don't #to all my german mutuals (dutuals) I LOVE YOU ALL PLEASE DONT THINK I HATE YOU OR GERMANY <3 #but basically i think it's really the conflict of the german directness and the swiss reservation that might make it seem like we don't #like germans #german stuff #helvetia #ask #anon

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enzoandriani · 3 years

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Robert Wilson, Tom Waits & William S. Burroughs The Black Rider: The Casting of the Magic Bullets is a lesser-known project of William S. Burroughs (who wrote the opera’s book) and a somewhat better-known work of Tom Waits (who composed the majority of the music and lyrics). The pair collaborated on the piece at the behest of theatrical visionary Robert Wilson, who staged and directed the avant-garde production which premiered in a German-language version at Hamburg’s Thalia Theatre on March 31, 1990. Mr. Burroughs, Waits said, “was always the scary old man to me, and he was scary when I met him. But he let everyone be a part of his whole creative process.” In Hamburg, Mr. Waits and Mr. Burroughs worked separately, at night, bringing their results to Mr. Wilson’s rehearsals the next morning. “Because of the way we worked,” Waits said, “the recordings naturally tended to be kind of crude, like work tapes, and I didn’t realize at the time that a lot of these recordings would eventually be released. Which was great for me. I’ve always struggled with that; as soon as I think we’re doing something for real, it just freezes me up. My favorite recordings tend to be those kind of uninhibited moments in music that had no idea that they were music.” Photo: Brinkhoff/Mogenburg https://www.instagram.com/p/Ca6f2gXugSy/?utm_medium=tumblr

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bloomingtalent · 3 years

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Things I like my RP partners to know:

I like to be called: I don't have a nickname to be called but you can call me Terra or Terra-mun. Or no nickname and just 'Hey!' or even 'Dude'. I'm cool with anything lol

One thing you should know about me: I can get emotional sometimes, whether because of a reply or rl things and I might sound like it to you and I'm not trying to make you feel a specific way so if you feel uncomfortable, tell me.

One thing you should know about RPing with my character(s): Hinata will sometimes get confused because she is neither the Hyuga Heiress nor the Byakugan Princess so don't be too surprised if Hinata doesn't know what you're talking about or refutes your statement.

First language: German though I think it's English since my German became very rusty. Unless you mean in what language I mainly rp in - that's English.

Age range: under 13 | 14–17 | 18–22 | 23–25 | 26–29 | 30+ | 40+ | 70+

Am I okay with NSFW?: Yes, unless it's in a very crude language or one-liners are used, then, no.

Canon Character RP Friendly?: yes | no |

OC RP Friendly?: yes | no | (although I'm very selective and tend to lose muse for threads quickly)

RP blog: does contain ooc posts - mostly ask memes and musings | doesn’t contain ooc posts | occasionally contains ooc

Tagged by: @uchiha-madara

Tagging: @phantasmalcalamity @hifimuses @ignitionxblast @anchoredstowaways @cc-sasuke @quirksandmiraculouses @starfirechan @changeliing @moonsmemoir @shikkotsunin @jiruga @perditus @believesit @ramenthings @naru-uzumaki @sociieties and anyone else who wants to

#uchiha-madara #out of confidence #dash games #:3

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shihozaki · 3 years

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Hey so I saw that your matchup requests were open and I wanted to request one for mha :)

About me: My name is Fairy (it's a kind of weird birth name but I've learned to ✨ c o - e x i s t ✨ with it) and im 16 years old! Im non-binary and I use she/they pronouns! My mbti personality is ENFP-T and my Hogwarts house is Gryffindor :). Im also an ambivert. Im an Aries sun, Aquarius moon and Leo rising! For the description of my style umm it's kind of a weird mix between a soft girl and a grunge style?? umm it's a bit confusing but I like to mix up things bc I think it's a bit fun? LMAO. For physical appearance umm im abt 5'7 or 5'8, and im a bit curvy, tho I'm usually insecure abt it and im scared of like just sitting on someone's laps and squishing them idk- I have brown hair and eyes, and I use glasses bc im fucking blind LMAO. For personality, I would say that when people first meet me they get the impression that im either A. Rude and mean or B. Im a sweet and nice angel who wouldn't hurt a fly. Tho when people actually get to meet me they realize that im really nice and cheerful. I'm also really chaotic (Oops- my bad). But sometimes I scare ppl away with my sarcasm or crude/dark humor. People also tend to not really like me bc im kind of good at reading people and their personalities which might come off as creepy (I mean it's not as if I liked knowing what type of personality they have just by meeting them for 2 days. People just tend to think that bc im able to read people's emotions and actions really well, they think I'll use it for my advantage by manipulating them??? Ummm?? I literally don't approve of doing things like that but ok?). Some of my hobbies are reading, writing poetry, listening to music, watching anime, doing arts-and-crafts, playing videogames, rollerskating, burning my homework, scaring children, having existential crises, drinking orange juice while singing to the titanic flute song and talking to the demon under my at 3 AM. (Umm ik its gonna sound kinda dumb but I also really like learning new languages, I speak Spanish, English, Portuguese, Russian and German. Rn I'm trying to learn how to speak french. And umm sometimes I have the habit of like saying words from another language while talking to someone. Like if I'm talking to someone in Spanish I will all of a sudden start speaking German. It's kind of an annoying thing for some, but it's a habit I've had since I was like 5 years old-)

MHA universe: I think that I would have a quirk where I can have the ability to manipulate matter or like a quirk where you can manipulate time?? Idk if it's possible for me to request having more than 2 quirks i umm-

What I look for in a s/o: Im Bisexual with a slight preference for guys- ummm idk what I would look for an s/o, but I think I would like someone who is straightforward, (basically kind of blunt) chill and laid-back while at the same time being nice and sarcastic?? Idk but basically someone who is able to balance out my dumbass chaotic energy with a calm and chill energy. (Also maybe a s/o who is smart. I usually have debates with people I like and I just- omg ok in my opinion smart people are hot-)

ANYHOW, I hope this isn't to much trouble for you! Feel free to ignore! Anyways thanks and have a nice day!

Thank you so much for waiting so patiently, I apologize for the wait! I had a hard time finding the perfect match for you, so I hope you like it!

I pair you up with Tsuyu Asui!

- Your quirk is matter manipulation! You can manipulate any matter based on time- kind of like Eri’s quirk. For example, if there was an apple, you can turn it to the past which would turn the Apple into a seed. If you turned it to the future, it would become a tree. You can control the amount of “time” you turn the matter into, and you can always bring it back into the original shape. Quick judgment is key to this quirk.

- You met Tsuyu in U.A! You were so excited to be in 1-A with other potential heroes, and it turns out you were sitting beside a very cute girl who resembled a frog

- You guys quickly became friends, hanging out often after school and decorating each other’s dorms together

- She is very smart, and helps you with your work. She placed 6th place in mid terms and she’s always willing to give you a helping hand!

- Tsuyu’s “no bs” personality helps tone down your dramatic and impulsive personality, while your passionate soul lights a spark in Tsuyu’s life.

- She is often very blunt and complimented you a lot, making you confused whether she sees you as a friend or as something more than that. So one day you just asked her out and she quickly (too quickly) agreed, and you guys became girlfriends after that!

- She can be sometimes a bit insecure, so you’re her personal cheerleader! She loved and appreciates you so much, and she tells you on a daily basis like it’s nothing

- You guys can literally talk to each other 24/7, and would never run out of things to talk about. The two different personality will often come up with new ideas every day

- She’s usually not very shy and is not the one to get embarrassed easily, but a simple hug or a kiss would be enough for her to be flustered. She immediately flushes red and smiles.

- She’s sometimes not very good with words, so instead she’ll show you love by physical touch- especially when she’s cold. Snuggling up to you is one of her favourite things to do during winter!

- Overall, you guys are such a cute couple, bringing inspiration and a force of energy to the people around you :)

Scenario: First time meeting!

‘That sleeping bag is our teacher?’ You thought as the yellow sleeping bag at the front of the class started his teaching. ‘This is going to be an interesting year…’ You chuckled to yourself. You took a look around the classroom. 1-A. You were finally on the path of becoming a hero. Majority of the kids in the class seemed nice (minus the spikey blonde boy) and calm. As you were exploring the room with your eyes, it met with another. She had long green hair and an interesting mouth- she was adorable. She stared back with an amused expression, occasionally blinking. ‘She’s really cute.’ You thought. ‘No, I have to pay attention in class. My bi-ness cannot be tingling right now.’ You turned your attention back to the board, wondering when the sleeping bag was going to stop talking. The teacher instructed the students to change into their training uniform and meet him at the field. As the students began to walk into the change rooms, you quickly caught up to the peculiar girl. “Hey! You can call me Fairy! Nice to meet you.” You introduced yourself. The girl smiled, extending her hand. “I’m Tsuyu Asui. You can call me Tsu.” She replied. “I like your glasses.” Your heart started beating faster at the compliment and you shook her hand. “Thanks! I have them because I’m blind.” You said, attempting to make a joke. She gave a small giggle, one enough to make your heart melt. ‘Yes, this is going to be an interesting year...’ You thought to yourself as you followed your new friend Tsu into the change room. ‘Who knows? I might finally get a girlfriend.’

Song: Don’t Stop Me Now by Queen!

I hope you enjoyed it! I enjoyed writing it, and I really liked your name too! Please do not hesitate to tell me what you thought about the work, and I hope to see you again soon :)

#anime fanfic #fanfic #fanfiction #mha matchup #matchups closed #bnha matchup #matchups #bnha x reader #tsuyuasui #tsuyuasuixreader

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seirioscanis · 5 years

Text

{ low on self-esteem, so you run on gasoline }

𝖖 𝖚 𝖔 𝖙 𝖊 𝖘

“The only way to deal with an unfree world is to become so absolutely free that your very existence is an act of rebellion.” -- Albert Camus

“We are unusual, tragic, and alive.” -- Dave Eggers

“I have a very childlike rage, and a very childlike loneliness.” -- Richey Edwards

“’Are you implying that shreds of my reputation remain intact?’ Will demanded with mock horror. ‘Clearly I have been doing something wrong. Or not something wrong, as the case may be.’ He banged on the side of the carriage. ‘Thomas! We must away at once to the nearest brothel. I seek scandal and low companionship.’” -- Will Herondale, Clockwork Angel

“Many atrocities have been done in the name of the greater good.” -- Rhysand, A Court of Mist and Fury

𝖇 𝖆 𝖘 𝖎 𝖈

NAME: Sirius Orion Black NICKNAMES: Padfoot, Pads AGE: 20 BIRTHDAY: 3 November 1959 GENDER: Demiboy, not that he has the word for that PRONOUNS: he/they

𝖋 𝖆 𝖒 𝖎 𝖑 𝖞

MOTHER: Walburga Black ( 55 ) FATHER: Orion Black ( 51, deceased ) SIBLINGS: Regulus Arcturus Black ( 18, deceased )

𝖕 𝖍 𝖞 𝖘 𝖎 𝖈 𝖆 𝖑 𝖆𝖙𝖙𝖗𝖎𝖇𝖚𝖙𝖊𝖘

FACE CLAIM: Samuel Larsen BUILD: Slim and muscular HAIR: Shoulder length and thick, normally kept in a bun HAIR COLOR: Black EYE COLOR: Brown SKIN COLOR: Pale DOMINANT HAND: Right handed, teaching himself slowly to write with his left as well for the hell of it (note: the handwriting is still awful). ANOMALIES: a scar on his upper right lip, ironically a small cluster of star-shaped birthmarks on his left hip (which he hates), a few old cigarette burns on his knees SCENT: leather, old spice, barber shop hair gel, cigarette smoke, motor oil ACCENT: British ALLERGIES: slightly lactose intolerant DISORDERS: Major depression, generalized anxiety, PTSD due to childhood trauma FASHION: Punk rock baby, though probably a bit out of date compared to what muggles are wearing now. He took what he could get during school, and now there’s not enough time in the day to work, be in the Order, and go shopping. NERVOUS TICS: His body becomes more tense, and his eyes dart around the room to search for an exit (or several if possible). He also subconsciously takes a step back from whatever is making him nervous, occasionally messes with his hair to try and act casual (though he does that when he’s bored as well, so it has to be seen with one of the others to be considered a sign of his nerves). If he’s particularly high strung, he’ll lose his nerve completely and lash out, no matter if it’s good or bad for the situation at hand. QUIRKS: Like mentioned above, he messes with his hair a lot when he’s bored, usually pulling it out of its hair tie if up and vice versa if down. He paces when plotting, and purses his lips when he’s thinking considerably. When he’s particularly happy he’ll do a little jump, and he appears to be vibrating a little even afterward. When uncomfortable he’ll try to push that feeling off with either an argument or joke, again no matter whether one of those choices is the wisest at the time.

𝖑 𝖎 𝖋 𝖊 𝖘 𝖙 𝖞 𝖑 𝖊

RESIDES: Plainview Points Apartments BORN: St. Mungo’s Hospital RAISED: Grimmauld Place, London PETS: n/a

CAREER: Auror-in-Training EXPERIENCE: He was part of the Hogwarts dueling club for two years before being kicked out for unfair sportsmanship. He also got a considerate amount of training in magic from an early age thanks to his family, and his mother in particular taught him a bit of dark magic--or tried to. Not that he would use the dark magic, but if push came to shove... he has a few tricks up his sleeve (or, at the very least, the theory behind some of the darker magics). EMPLOYER: Ministry of Magic

POLITICAL AFFILIATION: Order of the Phoenix BELIEFS: Sirius, without a shadow of a doubt, believes that muggleborns and halfbloods deserve to be equal to purebloods. It took him years to believe he was allowed to have that thought process, but he grabbed onto it once he did. Despite the years of unlearning what his family tried to instill in him, it wasn’t all successful. He does still have a superiority complex, and most definitely thinks himself above squibs, muggles, house elves, and so on. It takes more effort for him to respect their opinions as equal to his own, and though he knows that’s wrong, it’s taking a lot longer than he’d like to unlearn that--if he ever can. MISDEMEANORS: Illegal animagus, chase down with James on Elvendork, driving underage on an unregistered motorcycle, his entire list of detentions at Hogwarts FELONIES: Nothing officially on record, so really he’s as innocent as it gets DRUGS: n/a SMOKES: Way too much to be healthy for his lungs ALCOHOL: Not nearly as bad as his smoking habit DIET: Generally unhealthy because he can’t be bothered to cook

LANGUAGES: English, Latin, Spanish, Italian, French, some German

PHOBIAS: Extremely loud noises, snakes, thunderstorms HOBBIES: Causing general mischief, reading what he can get his hands on, doodling (albeit a bit crudely) TRAITS: { + }: loyal, intelligent, observant, quick-witted, sociable { - }: angry, impulsive, insensitive, defiant, pessimistic

𝖋 𝖆 𝖛 𝖔 𝖗 𝖎 𝖙 𝖊 𝖘

LOCATION: Potter Estate, Prewett Household, Hogwarts SPORTS TEAM: Tutshill Tornadoes GAME: Wizard’s Chess MUSIC: Punk Rock, Celestina Warbeck (not that he’d tell a soul) MOVIES: Has hardly seen any, but is fond of action movies FOOD: Thai BEVERAGE: Whiskey or iced tea COLOR: Dark green

𝖒 𝖆 𝖌 𝖎 𝖈

ALUMNI HOUSE: Gryffindor WAND (length, flexibility, wood, & core): 8 3/4 inches, slightly bendy, yew, rougarou hair core AMORTENTIA: honeysuckles, vanilla, cigarette smoke PATRONUS: Dog BOGGART: His parents standing over him shouting; recently with Regulus by their side asking why he had to die

𝖈 𝖍 𝖆 𝖗 𝖆 𝖈 𝖙 𝖊 𝖗

MORAL ALIGNMENT: Chaotic Good MBTI: ESTP-T MBTI ROLE: The Entrepreneur

“ ESTPs are energetic thrillseekers who are at their best when putting out fires, whether literal or metaphorical. They bring a sense of dynamic energy to their interactions with others and the world around them. They assess situations quickly and move adeptly to respond to immediate problems with practical solutions. Active and playful, ESTPs are often the life of the party and have a good sense of humor. They use their keen powers of observation to assess their audience and adapt quickly to keep interactions exciting. Although they typically appear very social, they are rarely sensitive; the ESTP prefers to keep things fast-paced and silly rather than emotional or serious. “

ENNEAGRAM: Type 8 ENNEAGRAM ROLE: The Challenger

” People of this personality type are essentially unwilling to be controlled, either by others or by their circumstances; they fully intend to be masters of their fate. Eights are strong willed, decisive, practical, tough minded and energetic. They also tend to be domineering; their unwillingness to be controlled by others frequently manifests in the need to control others instead. When healthy, this tendency is kept under check, but the tendency is always there, nevertheless, and can assume a central role in the Eight's interpersonal relationships. ”

TEMPERAMENT: Choleric

“ The choleric temperament is fundamentally ambitious and leader-like. They have a lot of aggression, energy, and/or passion, and try to instill it in others. They can dominate people of other temperaments, especially phlegmatic types. Many great charismatic military and political figures were choleric. They like to be in charge of everything. However, cholerics also tend to be either highly disorganized or highly organized. They do not have in-between setups, only one extreme to another. As well as being leader-like and assertive, cholerics also fall into deep and sudden depression. Essentially, they are very much prone to mood swings. “

WESTERN ZODIAC: Scorpio

“ Passionate, independent, and unafraid to blaze their own trail no matter what others think, Scorpios make a statement wherever they go. They love debates, aren't afraid of controversy, and won't back down from a debate. They also hate people who aren't genuine, and are all about being authentic—even if authentic isn't pretty. Because of all of these traits, a Scorpio can seem intimidating and somewhat closed off to those who don't know them well. But what people don't realize is that even though Scorpio may seem brusque, as a water sign, they also are very in tune with their emotions, and sometimes may find themselves caught up in their feelings. This leads to Scorpio's central conflict: Their feelings are what drives them and strengthens them, but their mutability can scare them and make them feel vulnerable and out of control. Because of this conflict, Scorpios, like their namesake, the scorpion, put up an outer shell and may seem prickly. But once people get beyond the shell, they find a loyal, loving person whose passion knows no bounds. Scorpio dives into all life has to offer with 110% enthusiasm. A Scorpio will be your most loyal friend, most dedicated employee—and your worst enemy, if they want to be. “

CHINESE ZODIAC: Year of the Pig

“ Pig is mild and a lucky animal representing carefree fun, good fortune and wealth. Personality traits of the people born under the sign of the Pig are happy, easygoing, honest, trusting, educated, sincere and brave. The possible dark sides the Pig people are stubbornness, naive, over-reliant, self-indulgent, easy to anger and materialistic. They are sometimes regarded as being lazy. “

PRIMAL SIGN: Squid

“ Squids are powerful personalities that can only be ‘checked and balanced’ by themselves. They are highly capable, intelligent individuals who seem to know everything. Generally good natured, they also have a hidden inner dark side which resides deep within themselves. No one is allowed into this secret place, often not even themselves. Squids will even try to bury painful truths within themselves in order to avoid dealing with difficult emotions and situations. “

TAROT CARD: Justice, High Priestess

“ Justice and The High Priestess have in common that everything is accounted for. Justice examines everything for flaws in order to find its flawless essence. The High Priestess knows the secret of everything as it is in order to encompass everything. Justice demands of everything its true nature and essence, with nothing concealed, withheld or distorted. It tirelessly weighs and measures, satisfied with nothing less than the clear, the absolute, and the irreduceable in everything. Justice is adamant and uncompromising with its sword and scales, loud and clear in its redness, fearless and certain on its throne, guarding the entrance to the temple of the secrets of perfection. The High Priestess finds what is the same in everything, the secret unifying core hidden in the endless variation of detail. She patiently discovers in all differences what is true, original and undisturbed in everything. The High Priestess is accepting and inclusive with her scroll and cross, calm and quiet in her blueness, fearless and certain on her throne, guarding the entrance to the temple of final knowledge. Unintegrated and imperfectly realized, Justice can be given to rage and haste; it can become arrogant and hypercritical, aggrieved and vengeful, or uncertain and vacillating. The High Priestess can be a conceited know-it-all, moody and taciturn, secret and unapproachable; she can be despairing and lost, or given to excess and careless of consequences. Together, they dream of the perfect, the ultimate, and pursue it in more than one kind of undertaking. They continuously seek the truth, and in its service they are drawn to esoteric studies and unusual paths. “

TV TROPES: White Sheep, Jerk with a Heart of Gold, In the Blood, Hot-blooded, Good is Not Nice, Cultural Rebel, Badass Biker SONGS: Gasoline, Halsey; The Future Freaks Me Out, Motion City Soundtrack; This is the End (For You My Friend), Anti-Flag; Hate Conquers All, Anti-Flag; Downtempo, Scouting for Girls;

IDEOLOGIES: - Actively cuts out everyone who was part of his childhood unless they’ve somehow proven they can be trusted again; he avoids his family at all costs. - The day he found out he was lactose intolerant, however mild, was a mournful day. He sulked about Hogwarts for about a week. - Legitimately tried to swim to the bottom of the Black Lake and see the giant squid. Never succeeded. - If you bring peanut butter anywhere near him he will chuck it across the room. He hates it. - Genuinely enjoys being a dog more than a human sometimes. Yes, he’s aware of the irony. - The only people allowed to make puns off of his name are James, Peter, Remus, Lily, and Marlene. He’ll get annoyed at anyone else who tries (also wise to avoid using the word serious around him for the above reason). - Keeps telling himself he’ll quit smoking someday. The likelihood of that actually happening is about slim to none, RIP to Sirius’ lungs.

#you don't have to be who they say you need to be -- { about }#dulcetask

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svartikotturinn · 5 years

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My speaker attitudes towards dialects

(Adapted from a Reddit comment of mine.)

People who think they know a thing or two about linguistics often tend to chastise others for their prescriptivism, especially others who know a thing or two about linguistics (and I should know—I got my BA in linguistics and East Asian studies). What they tend to ignore, however, is that a key part of linguistics is sociolinguistics, and a key part of that is speakers’ attitudes.

We are speakers. We live in a society where our language is spoken, and we know when and where certain features are used, and our attitude changes accordingly. It’s as inevitable as the change in language itself. Of course, sometimes it’s blatantly classist/racist/sexist, but that’s another issue. Oftentimes it’s purely æsthetic or something related to other issues.

So what about me as a speaker?

Generally I prefer conservative dialects of just about any language, as they maintain certain distinctions that others lose (which can lead to confusion or just less intuitive spelling and murkier etymology).

So, I’ll address the phonological level first.

In English, I like dialects that don’t mix up words like these:¹

Consonants:

Unstressed syllables:

ladder–latter

winner–winter

Syllable finally:

father–farther

Elsewhere:

wine–whine

Vowels:

Before ‹r›

marry–merry–Mary

higher–hire

coyer–coir

flower–flour

horse–hoarse

irk–erk, earn–urn, fur–fir²

Before ‹l›

vial–vile

real–reel

‹u…e›, ‹ew› after coronals

through–threw

you–yew

choose–chews

loot–lute

do–dew

toon–tune

Diphthongs:

wait–weight

Wales–wails

tow–toe

Unstressed syllables:

emission–a mission–omission

Pharaoh–farrow

shivaree–shivery

Otherwise:

cot–caught

meet–meat

The whole just makes so much more sense this way, especially if you’re teaching the language to learners, because that way there’s more of a 1:1 correspondence between orthography and spelling so there’s less memorizing involved (speaking as an English tutor and enthusiastic language learner).

It also helps when there’s a certain ‘symmetry’ in the vowel system, like when both ‹a…e› and ‹o…e› are pronounced as mid-high–high diphthongs (or just long mid-high vowels), one front and the other back; in the eastern half of the US and in the UK, that’s not really the case. Also the tense ‹a› vowel being pronounced the same in all environments makes it much less confusing to teach; in most American dialects, it tends to vary based on the sounds that follow it and whether it’s in a closed or open syllable, and in Australia (and I think certain places in the US) there’s an inconsistent split into two categories among the words. Shifts like those sometimes make more such distinctions (e.g. mad–Madd, and also put–putt for most dialects), but they can be a real headache to teach.

Similarly, I prefer to keep the vowel distinction of hurry–furry, as it makes morpheme boundaries clearer. The same for keeping the first vowel of sorry in words like corridor or horror, because it makes the orthography more consistent, following a clear rule:

A vowel letter before ‹rr› in an open syllable (within morpheme boundaries) is pronounced like a normal tense vowel.

In Hebrew, I have a special appreciation for ethnolects that maintain the distinction between:

uvular and pharyngeal voiceless fricatives, e.g. כָּךְ /käχ/ ‘thus’ vs. קַח /kä/ ‘take! masc. sing.’

glottal stops and voiced pharyngeal fricatives, e.g. אֵד /ʔe̞d/ ‘vapour’ vs. עֵד /ʕe̞d/ ‘witness’

velar and uvular plosives, e.g. כָּל /ko̞l/ ‘every’ vs. קוֹל /qo̞l/ ‘voice’³

plain and pharyngealized voiceless coronal plosives, e.g. תְּבִיעָה /tvi.ˈʕä/ ‘lawsuit’ vs. טְבִיעָה /tˤvi.ˈʕä/ ‘drowning’

plain vs. pharyngealized voiceless alveolar sibilant affricate, e.g. צָאר /t͡säʁ̞/ ‘tsar’ vs. צַר /t͡sˤäʁ̞/ ‘narrow masc. sing.’⁴

simple vs. geminate consonants, e.g. גָּמָל /gä.ˈmäl/ ‘camel’ vs. גַּמָּל /gäm.ˈmäl/ ‘(literary) camel driver’

There are other distinctions that I omitted here, mostly in terms of vowel length and quality: back in the times of the Mishna, Hebrew dialects had up to 7 or 8 different vowels and as many as 3 or even 4 different vowel lengths, but in Modern Israeli Hebrew, the vowels have coalesced into a system of five vowels with no length distinctions. However, those are pretty much obsolete except in liturgical uses, and I don’t care much for liturgical use except for academic interest because I have a very, very negative view of Orthodox Judaism. I somewhat lament the loss of such distinctions to that realm, especially since the loss of those distinctions means that a lot of Hebrew morphology and phonology no longer makes any immediate, intuitive sense (at least until you learn the logic behind it—then it makes a lot more sense but it’s still very mechanical), and is now basically the bane of every highschooler’s existence.

In Japanese, I like dialects which, unlike Standard Japanese (which is based on the Tokyo dialect and serves as the basis for transliteration and standard kana orthography), maintain the traditional distinction between:

Consonants:

plain vs. labialized velar plosives (both voiced and voiceless), e.g.

家事 /kaʑi/ ‘housework’ vs. 火事 /kʷaʑi/ ‘conflagration’

both normally transcribed kaji

雅歌 /gaka/ ‘elegant song’ vs. 画家 /gʷaka/ ‘painter’

both normally transcirbed gaka

voiced sibilant affricates vs. fricatives, e.g.:

alveolo-palatal ones: 地震 /d͡ʑiɕiɴ/ ‘earthquake’ vs. 自信 /ʑiɕiɴ/ ‘confidence’

both normally transcribed jishin

alveolar ones: 数 /käzɯᵝ/ ‘number’ vs. 下図 /käd͡zɯᵝ/ ‘the illustration below’

both normally transcribed jouzu or jōzu

/o/ vs. /wo/:

折る /oɾɯ/ ‘to fold’ vs. 居る /woɾɯ/ ‘to be’

both normally transcribed as oru

Vowels:

long mid-low and mid-high rounded vowels, e.g.:

～長 /–t͡ʃɔː/ ‘head or leader of’ vs. ～庁 /–t͡ʃoː/ ‘government office of’

both normally transcribed as chou or chō, pronounced /–t͡ʃo̞ː/ in Tokyo

In addition, I also like how the Kansai dialect allows for more varied pitch accent patterns than the Tokyo dialect. Distinctions like these, along with those mentioned above, could be immensely helpful in mitigating the preposterous amount of homophones it has (especially among Sino-Japanese loanwords) which make it so, so much harder for learners to master listening comprehension (and for native speakers to understand spoken academic or technical texts), but alas. It also makes the connection between less intuitive go-on & kan-on pairs, which generally remain a mystery to anyone who hasn’t researched them in depth or has any background in Chinese.

In other languages, I naturally prefer other such distinctions, e.g.:

Spanish dialects with lleísmo and distinción

French dialects that preserve all the vowels that Parisian French no longer does, and also between mid-high and mid-low vowels

Portuguese dialects that resist as many of the plethora of mergers other dialects have as possible

Italian dialects that distinguish between mid-high and mid-low vowels; examples of minimal pairs here

The North-central dialect of Vietnamese

Korean dialects that preserve vital distinctions in terms of vowel length and quality as well as pitch accent, and also initial /l/ in loanwords

Mandarin dialects that retain retroflex consonants, rather than merge them into alveolar sibilants (like in Taiwan and southern Mandarin dialects)

Cantonese dialects that retain the difference between

Tones

high and high-falling tones, e.g. 衫 /saːm⁵⁵/ ‘shirt’ vs. 三 /saːm⁵³/ ‘three’

Consonants

plain and labialized velar plosives, e.g. 各 /kɔk̚³/ ‘every, each’ vs. 國 /kwɔk̚³/ ‘country; national’

alveolar laterals and nasals, e.g. 里 /lei̯¹³/ ‘li’ vs. 你 /nei̯¹³/ ‘you sing.’

But at the same time, I’m not above political or regional biases, e.g.:

I like Arabic dialects that maintain the wide array of consonants of Modern Standard Arabic, but I feel very connected to my city of residence Haifa, so I prefer the dialects spoken in this region.

Also, I prefer Standard Taiwanese Mandarin (think Pearl in the Taiwanese dub of Steven Universe) over PRC Mandarin partially because, well, fuck Winnie the Pooh.

On a grammatical level, I love how dialects create subtler distinctions in terms of tense and aspect or pragmatic distinctions:

For example, while African–American English exhibits a wide array of phonological mergers (e.g. fin–thin, den–then), it also exhibits far subtler distinctions of tense and aspect that ‘Standard’ English lacks: compare the short AAE been knew vs. the much longer SE have known for a long time.

Another example is the modern ‘vocal fry’ (a.k.a. creaky voice) that some American girls have started using in the past few years, which marks parenthetical information in a sentence.

This is also why I like German dialects that have a wider use of the preterite (i.e. more northern ones), as opposed to those that have merged them entirely into the present perfect (e.g. in Bavaria). It’s also why I’m somewhat miffed by the merger of the 1st. sing. fut. conjugation of Hebrew verbs into the 3rd. masc. sing. fut. one, e.g. יַסְבִּיר /jäs.ˈbiʁ̞/ ‘[he] will explain’ vs. אַסְבִּיר /ʔäs.ˈbiʁ̞/ ‘[I] will explain’.

On the other hand, being non-binary, I have a special distaste for gendered morphology. This is why I came up with this system to do away with the last bit of gendering in English, and why although I find non-native speakers crude attempts at reinventing Hebrew morphology extremely distasteful (seriously, shit like that is why I say American Jews are, first and foremost, American),⁵ I do rejoice at any erosion I see of gender distinctions in Hebrew. It’s also why I like most sign languages so much—I say ‘most’, because Japanese SL, for example, has gendered pronouns (unlike ASL or Israeli SL, for example), and why I resent the Western influence that led to gendered pronouns becoming a thing in Japanese and Chinese, and why I often think about learning Finnish properly.⁶

On a lexical level, I have a particular affinity for archaisms, or more lexically conservative languages.

In the case of English:

I like dialects that preserve Old English archaisms, words from Old English that have been displaced by Latinate cognates, holding on like the Gaulish village of Astérix and Obelix. Words like gome and blee fascinate me and I wish they were in more common use, which is why I like the idea of Anglish so much.

I also like dialects that maintain mostly obsolete ‘irregular’ forms of verbs, for example clumb as the past participle of climb, as they provide a rare insight into the development of English.

And I most certainly like dialects that still use some variation of thou, like tha in Yorkshire or thee in Lancashire.

Hebrew, on the other hand, doesn’t really have any dialectical variations per se to speak of, or any ‘archaisms’ that they preserve, as it was pretty much dormant for nearly two millennia. Back when Jesus was still around, there was some regional variation among Hebrew speakers—this can be seen in the New Testament, for example, when people confront Simon Peter after Jesus is arrested and claim that his accent gives away the fact that he was one of Jesus’ men. For example, different accents of the time had notably different vowel systems, for example, which is why there were three different systems (roughly speaking) to indicate them at the time, and this is before we’ve even considered Samaritan Hebrew, which is about as comprehensible to a Modern Hebrew speaker as Doric (or even Frisian) is to an English speaker. Hebrew speakers borrow phrases extensively from their traditional literature, much like Chinese people with their four-character idioms, and often use more literary language in tongue-in-cheek, so it’s not really comparable. However, there is some amount of sociolinguistic variation as to doing so, but I would say it has more to do with religious and socio-economic status than ethnolect and certainly regional variation (which is far more limited in Hebrew than in English, mostly confined to rather small subsets of regionalisms), and I do like it when people do use these.

This is why I appreciate Québec French, for all its overzealously purist and prescriptivist faults. It’s often a wonderful museum of words of bygone days, from dialects that the efforts to standardize French have nearly if not completely exterminated. As an English speaker in particular, it’s interesting to see Norman remnants in the language.

On the other hand, it always fascinates me when languages borrow words for concepts they already have, and use the loanword for a more specific concept therein. Consider, for example, the English words kingly (Germanic), royal (Norman), and regal (Latin), or these fascinating examples.

The problem is that many of these features are fairly stigmatized.

In terms of phonology, I make a conscious effort to maintain most of the distinctions above when I speak English, but on the other hand I flap my ‹t›s and ‹d›s in rapid speech to avoid sounding like a stuck-up prick. Similarly, I don’t maintain the wine–whine distinction, for example, unless, say, I’m working with a student on a story that takes place in the Southern US, because I would sound like a dick who’s trying to sound like a Southern gentleman or something. I still teach the distinction, if only to explain why there is such a difference in the orthography to begin with even if I tell students not to observe it when actually speaking. When I speak Hebrew, I most certainly don’t make those traditional ethnolect distinctions—that would come across as being either unbelievably pedantic or outright mocking. When I speak Japanese or other languages, well, I generally don’t know them well enough to maintain all the distinctions as I would like to, even those that aren’t stigmatized, but I do make an effort to at least observe those distinctions when the orthography makes them clear enough (and stick to the standard in Japanese).

In terms of grammar, I don’t teach dialectical English irregular forms. At most, I gloss over them with a sentence or two, and leave it at that. I assume my average student would hardly read books or watch films or TV shows that take place in Appalachia or what-have-you, certainly not without subtitles anyway. If I ever got a particularly advanced student, however… I would still be reluctant, as I am hardly over-familiar with those dialects myself, and don’t want to mislead them. In Hebrew, on the other hand, my grammar and spelling do tend to be very conservative to the point of anachronism sometimes (like, I generally follow the BuMP rule when I speak; most Israelis don’t), but I balance it out with a decent amount of slang.

In terms of lexical items, I pretty much avoid teaching dialectical archaisms altogether. Those are almost entirely useless for students, and I don’t even speak the dialects that use them, so I can’t say for a fact which dialecticalisms are even in current use. In Hebrew, I might make some detours, but that’s because truly archaic words, that wouldn’t even be used in tongue-in-cheek, are a rarity, and oftentimes they share roots with more common words, so they can cement the understanding of those roots more readily.

If no socio-linguistic considerations (or my own fluency) were a complete non-issue?

In English:

I’d make an effort to maintain all of the distinctions mentioned above, including those that are observed today only by a handful of older people from rural areas.

I’d pronounce ‹gh› in words like right and weight to tell them apart from rite and wait.

I’d use thou and AAE grammar and any dialectical archaism or even Anglish coinage I could get away with.

And, of course, I’d use my gender-neutral pronoun system for everyone except trans people who might get dysphoric.

In Hebrew:

I’d speak Hebrew with extremely conservative pronunciation, like BCE-level ancient, making all of the distinctions mentioned above.

On top of those, I would distinguish between the voiceless alveolar sibilant and lateral fricatives (which was lost very early on), so I pronounce סוֹרֵר /soː.ˈreːr/ ‘unruly, recalcitrant’ and שׂוֹרֵר /ɬoː.ˈreːr/ ‘existing, prevailing’ (both in masc. sing.) differently (rather than pronounce both like the first).

I’d reintroduce syllable-final glottal stops so that the orthography and grammar finally make a lick of sense.

On the other hand, I would think of a system to do away with gendered language in Hebrew that still made internal sense.

In Japanese:

I’d speak Japanese with all of the distinctions mentioned above, the fact that they characterize two parts of Japan that are practically on oppsite ends of the country be damned.

I might maybe even bring back a few obsolete features, like nasal vowels or the syllable ye and palatalized consonants before e (when applicable), because they make go-on and kan-on relationships clearer, and also clear up their relationship to Mandarin and other languages with extensive Sinitic vocabulary. (Although I doubt there are modern dialects that do that today, certainly not in a discriminating way, so I might give up on that.)

And, of course, I would do it all with Kansai pitch accent, or at least There are too many homophones, damnit, I gotta tell them apart SOMEHOW!

In Mandarin:

I’d speak Mandarin with Standard Taiwanese pronunciation.

Maybe I’d even use the Old National Pronunciation—what with my background in Japanese, it would save me a lot of memorizing, because I’d remember that all the characters that ended with a voiceless consonant in Japanese have the same tone in Mandarin.

Hell, I might even reintroduce the distinction between /e/, /ɔ/, and /a/.

In Cantonese:

I’d distinguish between the tones and the initial consonants, as mentioned above.

In addition, I might even bring back the distinction between alveolar and palato-alveolar sibilants that died in 1950—it’ll certainly make things easier for me, as I’ve learned some Mandarin in the past.

In Korean:

I’d speak a mix of dialects preserving all of the above distinctions and then some; I’d probably sound a lot like I were from North Korea, but in this scenario this wouldn’t matter.

In Vietnamese:

North-central dialect all the way.

In that scenario, the only thing that would stop me from talking like that would be comprehensibility. It would definitely be an issue—even today English speakers would probably be thrown off by pronouncing the ‹gh›, for one, and I’m sure my variety of Hebrew would be incomprehensible to most native speakers today.

But for now, I’ll make do with what I got, I guess.

—

Endnotes

¹ Most dialects that do mix them up generally pronounce them like the former in each pair.

² These distinction traditionally exists in Scotland; Ireland has a two-way split that works differently. On this note, I’d also count distinctions between e.g. wait and weight, but at this point it’s already Scots, not English. (Which is just another reason I love Scots so much, along with its lexical conservatism.)

³ This distinction, as well as the three that follow, are exceedingly rare.

⁴ The phranyngealized voiceless alveolar sibilant affricate was not preserved as such in any ethnolect: it either became a pharyngealized voiceless alveolar sibilant fricative (in Yemenite and Mizrahi Hebrew), or it simply lost its pharyngealization (in Sephardi and Ashkenazi Hebrew, and Modern Israeli Hebrew)—e.g. צַד /t͡sˤäd/ > /sˤäd/, /t͡säd/ ‘side’. Barring the exceedingly rare loanword, I could not think of a single minimal pair such as the one given above.

⁵ For the record: I was raised speaking English alongside Hebrew, albeit in a non-Anglophone country, and a lot of research went into my solution to ensure that it’s based on precedent rather than be a tasteless neologism.

⁶ There are other genderless languages as well, but they’re either super-niche or spoken by communities that aren’t as progressive, or both.

#linguistics #sociolinguistics #speaker attitude #personal #languages #dialects #dialectology

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senzacaponecoda · 6 years

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A crude sketch of my main conlang’s grammar

I wrote this before the first alphabet post and want to close the window its in. i don’t want to delete it i guess Pa'atic:

Phonology:

Consonants:

p t c k - ' b d j g - t' c' q - d' j' g' f s - - ħ h - s' - z - - 3 - z' m n - r - l w - y ---

ii uu i u a aa Emphatic consonants (here, written with ') may be pronounced with pharyngealization or velarization. /q/ and /g'/ are uvular.

Between vowels, oral stops are realized as fricatives. Word final /t/ (but not /t'/) obeys rules roughly equivalent to French elision, going silent pre-pausally and before consonants. In medial clusters, c tends to become a fricative preferentially, otherwise the first stop fricates. R behaves like Spanish.

Syllable structure is preferentially open, although the most common is CVC. CVCC is acceptable word-finally, such as in the word mact (what?).

Generally the second open syllable of a word receives stress; stress triggers a vowel to be realized as its "long" counterpart. Typically secondary stress follows an iambic pattern if applicable. Single syllable words are typically ambiguously stressed (just like the English word "the")

Short vowels are centralized, XSAMPA I, U, and E (cf English bit, look, stuff)

Most words are either CVC, CVC(V)C, or CVCCVC.

At the phrase level, VSO and strongly head initial. This extends to other associated patterns: adjectives follow nouns, prepositional, Place Manner Time. Still, the language provides a topicalization marker -aw to front phrases. Where clauses are introduced with relative pronouns may also be argued to be an example of SVO.

Morphosyntactically, Nominative-Accusative.

If verbs share arguments, at least a subject but preferably all subsequent arguments, they may be serialized instead of linked by conjunction; think "he chased and caught the cat" > "chased caught he the cat".

At the inflectional level, the language is relatively circumflexing, but mostly suffixing.

Normal verbs may have their inflection inferred from their infinitive stem.

From the infinitive, 4 principle 'states', to borrow a parallel idea from the nominal grammar, are derived, differing principally in aspect:

from an underlying perfect stem: perfective - for completed actions, usually English's simple past or the past perfect constructions (ate, had eaten)

stative - for actions without regard to tense but are relevant, usually english's present perfect (have eaten, [with his] having eaten), often is-participle adjectives as well (is done).

from an underlying imperfect stem: imperfective - for incomplete actions, usually English's progressive tenses (am eating, will eat, was eating) cursive - for habitual actions, 'long-distance' imperfective verbs (”I am learning German”), usually English's simple present.

Perfect verbs suffix in inflection. Imperfective verbs circumflex, with a separate fossil pronoun system for the prefixes; this is akin to analogous systems in other AA languages.

Most verbs fall under one of two conjugation families, simple and waw. They differ mostly by ablaut of a to i or a to u from imperfect to perfect; the waw-conjugation also shows reduction of semivowels.

Supplemental verbs exist as well, usually split along stem lines.

Zero copula, but may be supplemented by the irregular verbs yura or 3irka, depending on context.

The personal endings are: 1 ' - (w)i (-uy if the stem ends on -a (cannibalizing the a)) (sg) n - án (pl) n - anna (du) 2m k - ku n - kán n - kanna 2f c - ti n - tán n - tanna 3m y - su, f (imperfect, perfect) n - sán n - sanna 3f y - si, t n - sán n - sanna

---

Normal nouns have their inflection inferred from their definite singular.

The feminine is almost always indicated with a suffix -t, or rarely, for certain collectives, a prefix t-. While irregular nouns exist, gender is almost always predictable.

Nouns take three or four basic stems, called states, three cases, and three numbers.

The states are as follows: (with manas, leg)

definite - the definate article carries case; may be prefixed by the number prefixes. "Segolates" (CVCC roots) show a schwa (a) splitting the final consonant cluster (la manas) indefinite - no definite article; the root is suffixed with u or i (following t, but not t'), case is delivered as a suffix to this stem. Number may be prefixed to the noun, normally. (mansu) construct - used to create compound nouns, heads of genitive phrases, subject of passive verbs, adverbal uses, some others; the indefinate root is circumfixed with a-a, to which case and number may be applied (definite constructs take a declined article and are not declined). (amansa) The cases are as follows:

nominative - unmarked (la manas, mansu, amansa) accusative - marked with n (lan manas, mansun, amansan) oblique - marked with r; when preceded by a noun in the construct state, it is genitive, otherwise, it is interpreted as dative by default. (lar manas, mansur, amansar) The numbers are as follows:

singular - unmarked (la manas, mansu, amansa) plural - prefixed with ú- or w- (the latter before vowels). the nominative article la loses its vowel; l-u... First syllable -a-s usually deleted (l-umnas, umansu, wamansa) dual - the plural, but prefixed with ag-. (l-agumnas, agumansu, agwamansa) Personal (pronoun) possession is marked as if the noun is conjugated: mansawi

---

Adjectives may be nominal or verbal in nature.

Prepositions are conjugated the same as verbs. The irregular demonstrative ka(t) "that" follows its noun. Is more, but this is just a sketch.

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thedinkyandstinkyfritzworkshop · 6 years

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Covet of the Blind Eye - Legendary Rank Member

Name: Barnabas Paternoster (suspected to be an alias due to no records of any individual called “Barnabas Paternoster” matching his description). Expressively responds to “Sir” and no other honorific.

Description: Speaks with a German accent - seems to comprehend all languages. Average height, male, muscular build (only suspected from the shape of his body against his clothes - there are no reports of him revealing any portion of his body). He commonly wears a grey torn poncho with unwatchable (we have tried desperately - it smells so bad) blood stains from various creatures; leather gloves and buckled boots; an Andrewsarchus hide tunic (he proclaims to have a tunic for each day of the week - made of different specimens from the Andrewsachus species); leather pants; and a leather hat similar to the fashion of fantasy witch or vampire hunters. The only portion of his face that can be witnessed is a set of two glowing eyes. Despite scientific and supernatural uses of light nothing can pierce the darkness shrouding his face. His crude and inhumane treatment of others has lead fellow members of Legendary Ranks to increase Sr. Paternoster’s quota as much as possible (he somehow completes anything in minutes without anyone seeing).

Origin : Unknown. Furthest delve into his history that could be gathered was just minutes prior to his joining Covet of the Blind Eye. Not even divine beings seem to recognize Sr. Paternoster beyond that point of history. However, any mutual investigation with Eldritch entities results with “It has always been - always is it. Now it slithers in a new skin but the same mind, as we tend to do.” Attempting to use Hoshiko’s potent supernatural abilities to uncover Sr. Paternoster’s true origins seems to results in Hoshiko going into a week - 3 month coma from severe psychological trauma. The only information that she could provide was “It will swallow everything and spit it back up.”

Responsibilities: Lead Researcher of Eldritch Entities and Overseer of Field Protocols. Publisher of the following: When to Mind Your Own Damn Business, 300 Ways to Piss Off Divines, Stop Fucking Weird Shit, & Blast Them Bastards Down.

Supernatural Qualities: Can manipulate time to his own perspective. Immune to all psychological effects (even that of Eldritch Entities). His range of telepathy is unknown, but the furthest it has recorded of him using the ability is 500ft. Can summon tentacles reaching 15ft with no effort. Despite having several deities of death sent to eliminate Sr. Paternoster, he has managed to survive unscathed.

Additional Notes:

No longer permitted to commit an act called “A Quickie for the Thinkie” - not even if partner is consenting (all outcomes have spawned a viral species of Eldritch called Ja’Kzon from the remains of the partner).

All interactions between Sr. Paternoster and Eldritch Entities must be supervised by members no rank less than Epic for research and security purposes.

Forbidden from consuming or injecting any dosage of caffeine, alcohol, or prescription and illegal drugs without proper containment procedures for research purposes.

Has been known to somehow influence suicide and on rare occasions prevent it despite not having any interactions with the victim during self harming stages.

Whenever a creature has specifically addressed him as “Jophsein” the creature would die within the day due to uncertain circumstances. Researchers have addressed him as various other names, but “Jophsien” was the only one to produce an effect. This had lead to suspicion of Barnabas Paternoster being a spawn of Jophsein.

The “One Does Not Simply Meme” does not imply a challenge.

Only permitted to bring prepackage ice to potlucks or banquets (the last incidents of laxative/drugged beverages/foods, drug laced utensils/plates/cups, and disturbing taste in music are reason for no person accepting such items from Sr. Paternoster).

All novels and films produced by Sr. Paternoster must go through intense censorship and editing prior to publication. Displaying uncensored works by Sr. Paternoster are forbidden due to their dangerous effects on mass media (results have shown what researchers call “A Total Usurpation of the Id”). Only individuals with immunity to psychological effects are permitted to view and edit media produced by Sr. Paternoster.

Does not need a flashlight. DO NOT GIVE HIM A FLASHLIGHT (if you are at gunpoint to give him a flashlight simply accept death).

When within 15ft his presence works as a perfect power source for electronic devices.

Sometimes appears to be missing limbs. Studies have shown that similar to his ability to summon tentacles his physical form is able to mold to convenience and not restrained to a certain anatomy.

No longer allowed to replace childhood memories with famous horror scenes from the victim’s or killer’s perspective. Also not permitted to replace any memory with a scene from any pornographic film from any creature’s perspective (don’t ask - we unfortunately have to clear his search history every minute, you don’t want to know).

Despite crude and carnal behaviors Sr. Paternoster is surprisingly abstinent. Reasons for this are unknown but questioning Sr. Paternoster resulted in, “Why would I continue to impregnate something I wish could of aborted?”

#rpg #fritzworkshop #fantasy #scifi #wip #character #npc #barnabas paternoster #covet of the blind eye #eldritch #art #drawing #funny #creepy

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misterbombastic · 7 years

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First things first: we actually do know what elves called their dicks, because even the glorious JRRT couldn't keep his hands out of his pants. The poetic term (yes, elves seem to have engaged in erotic poetry) would be gwî, but for everyday usage gwib was the preferred term. Puntl is provided as the coarse, moderately transgressive term, and likely what you would be invited to suck if you went down on a male elf. Alas, due to the ban on the Noldorin language, we have no surviving slang for Fëanor's johnson.

Second, if we assume that JRRT's intention is the guiding light for inferred details of the history and function of Arda, we are left with several clues as to the genital features of elves. In early drafts of the Silmarillion and pre-LotR writings that would eventually give rise to the War of the Ring, JRRT called them "gnomes" rather than "elves," a detail that reflects his internal monologue about them and is consistent with his para-LotR writings about them, including mutilations, betrayals, incest, genocide, colonial violence, and misotheistic rebellion. His mental image during the construction of Ardan history was almost certainly closer to the Rankin-Bass imagery than the Peter Jackson interpretation. Thus we are left to interpret the idea of gnomes-- a Paracelsean ideology tied closely to alchemy-- and of their Germanic and Norse equivalents, nature and household spirits that include classic Germanic dweorgs (that is, dwarves) but with the added qualification of tallness as a common indicator of worthiness.

I discern here between dwarf-figures of Greek and British mythology, which tend to be lusty, massively endowed pranksters, and gnomes/dweorgs, which are rarely cast in a sexual light. Some textual support could be interpreted for the influence of Pan on the elves, given that Silvan elves (and their Rivendell cousins) are singing, dancing, merry-making, traveler-harassing figures throughout the books. If we adhere to this interpretation, elves are probably packing huge veiny wangs that could put your fucking eye out while you're trying to slip em the suck.

I feel that it is, however, more likely that JRRT would have viewed his elves as more romantic and less sexual. Certainly they reproduce at an exceedingly slow rate and for an incredibly small window of their adult lives. A Panic elf would be extremely unlikely to live for two thousand or more years and sire no more than three or four offspring. For this reason, we are most likely dealing with the less overt sexual characteristics of a Paracelsean elf, which rules out giant Priapus-style horse cocks that are eternally bone-ready, but leaves us with less to go on than we might need, if we're gonna pour a giant silicone elf dick.

Ah, but now we've alluded to reproductive evidence of elvish sexual activity, and down this road we find some very interesting possibilities. For one thing, the gnomes of Paracelsus were closely related to the concept of the homunculus, and tended to be sexless or at most secondary-masculine (think garden gnomes). We can assume, in combination with the romantic, Victorianistic leanings of JRRT, that male elves were not afflicted with unwanted boners, and found it fairly simple to reserve their sexual activity to intramarital intercourse. Additionally, in the extracurricular writing Laws and Customs of the Elves (LACE henceforth), we find some fascinating aspects of elvish sexuality laid bare. Elves are incapable, it seems, of adultery, which actually kills them. They are also heavily implied to be incapable of masturbation, and are explicitly hesitant to remarry after the death of a spouse, which carries over into the Silmarillion, when Fëanor's father seeks permission from the spirit of his mother (who has died in childbirth) to remarry. Clearly, something about their physiology and/or psychology is not compatible in any way with promiscuity, and the consequences of promiscuity can be literally fatal.

The lethality of sex can, I feel, be best comprehended as an immune function similar to rH incompatibility between mother and fetus. It would, from an evolutionary standpoint, benefit a male elf (ellyn) to be certain that his offspring are actually his own, since their gestation and childhood are protracted and may consume a great deal of resources. This may have resulted in a gradual evolutionary arms race, in which an ellyn might conjugate not only his genetic material but also a dose of antibodies and/or chimeric B-cells, which are keyed to attack all sperm without his specific antigen set. In return, the female elf (or elleth) might perhaps develop her own antibody/B-cell dosage, but this begs the question of how to confer them to the male, since transmission of microbes from vagina to penis is much less reliable than the inverse. I am getting a horrible idea and I will refer back to this concept in a moment.

So assuming that extramarital sex results in autoimmune-induced death similar to anaphylaxis in mechanism, we ask ourselves: what about the other compelling aspect of elvish sexuality, that of interbreeding with humans? Leaving out the question of DNA compatibility-- which is demonstrated in canon, and which we must accept as legitimate if we are to consider this topic at all-- we have a disturbing question to address. We have multiple incidents throughout the history of Beleriand and Middle-Earth of elven/human offspring, all of which occur between a Man and an elleth. Given that the two species are capable of creating not only hybrids but fertile hybrids (Elrond produced three offspring), it is foolish to imagine that in all of Ardan history there was never a potential ellyn-woman romance that resulted in offspring, unless there was something preventing reproduction between ellyn and woman that did not exist between man and elleth. The safest bet is not that all ellyn-woman romances remained chaste-- anyone who's met a teenager can tell you better than that-- but that ellyn-woman sexual activity is incapable of producing offspring.

This is extremely unusual, as the most obvious reason for sex-discriminant infertility is more likely to favor female humans than male humans. Human ova contain mitochondria, while human sperm consume their mitochondrial power for motility and do not confer mitochondrial DNA to their offspring. Either something is happening on an immune/cellular level, which would seem to conflict with our immunological theory of lethal adultery, or something is happening on the mechanical level-- something which is, perhaps, related to the transference of female immune material to the male partner.

Perhaps, to put it crudely, the ellyn just can't get it up.

In humans, the penis consists of several structures of erectile tissue which cradle the urethra between them. This specialized tissue is capable of interrupting venous return, creating penile engorgement and thus erection by trapping blood within the corpus cavernosum. This tissue is notoriously indiscriminant about stimuli, making it easy for male humans to ejaculate without even the participation of another human. Elves, on the other hand, can't even masturbate, an activity so universal among species with external genitalia that it's almost unimaginable for a species capable of poetry to be incapable of wanking. And yet human males can couple with elven females. This implies some weird-ass shit, so I suggest you pour yourself that drink right now.

Male elves achieve erection by external constriction. To have sex, they need some biological equivalent of a cock ring. Whether their penises are "innies" or just flaccid except during intercourse, they are incapable of restricting venous return on their own... and yet the elven vulva must be compatible to some degree with penetration, or else man/elleth coupling wouldn't produce offspring. One may, if one is willing to consider extreme possibilities, entertain the idea that the elven vulva may exhibit some mechanical trait that assists the ellyn in achieving erection by constriction, by restricting venous return through strangulation.

Something that would not put off human males universally, although it might make man/elleth couplings more rare and account for the relative scarcity of elf/human offspring.

Something that would make it impossible for an ellyn to penetrate a woman, or to achieve orgasm and ejaculation with a human female.

Something that would even allow the ellyn to contribute internal disposition of antibodies and B-cells reliably, potentially through urethral penetration of the penis.

The elvish vulva, my friends, consists of outer labia, inner labia, a vaginal vestibule opening on a penetrable vaginal canal, and a set of tentacles.

In elven intercourse, the vulval tentacles constrict and penetrate the flaccid penis, simultaneously permitting/inducing erection and depositing immune bodies deep in the genitourinary tract, most likely the bladder, where they can swim up the ureters to the renal anastomosis and infiltrate the bloodstream. The erect elvish penis is then able to deposit its genetic-- and immune-- material within the vagina. Human females, having no corollary to these tentacles, can arouse a male elf and even engage in non-PIV sexual activity, but can never obtain genetic material from male elves, and therefore no ellyn/woman pregnancies occur.

For human females, this means you can have a hot elf boyfriend that can never get you pregnant, but he's likely to leave you eventually for somebody who can actually get him off. Male elves probably got the fuck around in Middle-Earth, since they could chow down on human pussy for decades before settling down with a nice elleth who would get knocked up as soon as they exchanged fluids.

For human males, this means that you're totally capable of landing a hot lady elf, as long as you don't mind her tentacles crawling up your dick every time you shark her in the ass while she's asleep, and as long as you don't mind that she can totally cheat on you and in fact might have chosen to fuck you specifically because she can screw around behind your back without breaking out in a fatal case of hives.

Aragorn was one kinky-ass fucker.

And if you read all the way through this drunken, giggling spiel, the silicone elf dick you're looking for is of normal to generous proportion, but it's strangled up and down with simulated tentacles, or at least constricted by a really tight cock ring.

I thought way the fuck too much about this. I consulted the LACE about this. Fuck every last one of you for goading me into this nightmare of grisly overanalytic humiliation. I hope all your girlfriends catch you.

#source: elise the great from something awful

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megwcitycourse · 4 years

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The Double Life of a College Town

From 2010 until 2018 (with the exception of 10 months in 2012-2013 when I studied abroad in Barcelona) I lived in Urbana, Illinois, USA. This (unremarkable to most of the world) small city has an estimated population of 42,214 (U.S. Census Bureau, Urbana) but sits attached to Champaign with another 88,909 (U.S. Census Bureau, Champaign). While I lived almost exclusively in Urbana, the truth is that the two cities mostly behave as one, whether you call it Champaign-Urbana or Urbana/Champaign or Chambana or Bubble City, etc. (That last one is mostly a gimmick name used for events. Champaign - Champagne - get it?)

Cronin (2006) links his micro-cosmopolitanism to fractal differentialism. He explains, “This term expresses the notion of a cultural complexity which remains constant from the micro to the macro scale. That is to say, the same degree of diversity is to be found at the level of entities judged to be small or insignificant as at the level of large entities” (15).

Champaign-Urbana is mostly known for being the home of the main campus of the University of Illinois, which is my alma mater (I’m told that’s a very American phrase). A large research university of over 50,000 students (“UIUC”), it dominates the twin cities while simultaneously being somewhat discrete from the surrounding area. Champaign and Urbana are technically two cities - Champaign-Urbana is also two cities in a more figurative sense. You have students, and you have townies. You have Campustown, and you have downtown Champaign or Urbana (on either side). I’ve always kind of straddled the two - I joined a group soon after coming to the University that was comprised of both students and townies and I made friends with both. Went to parties off campus and attended classes on. While I was a student, I lived in both Champaign-Urbanas.

I cited Cronin above to highlight the reason why I gave the population sizes of Champaign and Urbana in the first paragraph. I wanted to illustrate that, despite its significantly smaller size than any of the world’s major cities, Champaign/Urbana exhibits many of the same tensions we would expect from places like Toronto, Chicago, London, Tokyo, etc. We can even find some of these tensions just within the University’s campus.

In “Serendipitous City: In Search of an Aleatory Urbanism,” Mervyn Horgan (2014) gives us the “city of birds” and the “city of worms,” two representational modes accounting for different methods in urban studies. Of the city of birds, he writes, “the urban is treated as an object to be described and known through accurate and complete description of what is objectively available and analyzable” (64). By contrast, “In the city of worms, the urban is treated as a subject to be interpreted and understood.” Put another way, “Where the city of birds is populated, the city of worms is peopled” (67). From the city of birds, we get disciplines such as urban planning and demography, whereas the city of worms gives us ethnography and literature (69).

For about a year, I was majoring in Computer Science (until I realized I was not very good at it and did not, in fact, want to spend the rest of my working life doing it). I was also taking German at the time, and between the two classes, I had a bit of a walk across campus, from the southeast corner of the Main Quad to the east side of the Engineering Quad (map below - the Foreign Languages Building, or FLB, is crudely circled in blue and the Siebel Center for Computer Science in red).

(Google Maps)

I took this walk up Mathews Avenue a couple of times a week, and at some point I realized that there was a noticeable demographic shift as I moved from the Main Quad (housing primarily the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences) to the Engineering Quad. Slowly but surely, the students I passed by trended more male. An unfortunate side effect of the (improving, but still prevalent) dominance of men in the engineering disciplines. I was never the only woman in my computer science classes, but it was usually in the single digits, and it showed when I crossed Green Street to arrive on the engineering side of the U of I campus. I see this experience as a meeting of Horgan’s “city of birds” and “city of worms.” In a small city like Champaign-Urbana - in an even smaller “city” like the UIUC campus - you can see how the demographic makeup shifts on just a ten-minute walk.

The buildings around me also changed on this little walk - noticeably more money has been spent on the engineering programs on campus compared to the liberal arts. You can see it in the more modern buildings full of metal and glass and new, functioning equipment, compared to FLB, a building I had most of my courses in and later worked in for about a year and a half, a brick building with a chilly basement and old carpeting, and three usually-working laptops that I had to loan out to grad students who didn’t have their own. Granted, computers are slightly less important to non-computer science students, but, in this day and age, only slightly. More on this dichotomy a bit later on.

Even more stark than the shift in gender demographics from one side of campus to the other was the shift between on and off campus demographics. I moved into an apartment off campus in 2011 and got a car around the same time. Experiencing Champaign/Urbana by car was a whole different world from on foot. Though the areas closest to campus were still dominated by students, the farther away I got, the more variety I saw in the age range of the pedestrians. I also noted a drop in the number of pedestrians overall (this was the reason I frequently stated that I hated driving on campus), as well as a decline in how pedestrian friendly the streets were. Interestingly enough, despite the abundance of crosswalks on campus, jaywalking seemed equally rampant just about everywhere. (Keep jaywalking in mind - I’m going to mention it later on.)

The types of cars I tended to see also changed depending on whether I was in Campustown or elsewhere. Campustown, being prime real estate for proximity to the main campus as well as to bars and restaurants, was (increasingly, as the years went on) full of expensive high rises boasting as many amenities as possible to students who could afford to take advantage. I pulled the image below from the 309 Green website (this was one of the high rises that has been there since I moved to town - several others cropped up later):

(“309 Green”)

I won’t say all of the buildings in Campustown had a pool, but most of them had advertising materials that looked roughly like this. With most off campus apartments, you’d be lucky if they had their own website with more than a couple of photos, and they certainly didn’t come with high-speed internet, central A/C, washer and dryer, fitness center, etc. And while I drove in Campustown only a few times a month, every time, I could tell exactly where I was by both the number of pedestrians and the luxury cars that surrounded my humble Honda.

According to Myria Georgiou (2014), top-down (or hegemonic) cosmopolitanism “represents the project of the neoliberal city… enabled through the close collaboration of local and national government and corporate interests.” On the other hand, “Vernacular cosmopolitanism is about hospitality, which, though conditional… makes the urban landscape’s history and present always a history-in-the-making, a history of newcomers” (65).

I’ve seen echoes of this dichotomy both on the UIUC campus and in Champaign-Urbana more broadly. Near the afore-mentioned FLB is a row of buildings on Nevada Street referred to as the “cultural houses”. Here’s why:

(Google Maps)

That brick one on the right is the Native American House, the pale yellow one on the left is La Casa Cultural Latina. The Departments of Gender and Women’s Studies, Asian American Studies, and African American Studies are also on this street. The idea here is that students of all kinds feel welcome, have a “home” (never mind the graffiti that started showing up outside of La Casa right around, oh, 2016 or so). There’s a bit of irony in having a “Native American House” right in the middle of Kiikaapoi, Miami, Peoria, and Očeti Šakówiŋ lands, but that’s a another post ("Native Land”). (Spoiler alert: the U of I doesn’t have a great history [or present] when it comes to respecting indigenous peoples.)

Then, we have the Siebel Center:

(Ngo 2014)

It’s a hulking mass of a building compared to those cultural houses, full of the kind of money the University and its donors are willing to spend on the Computer Science program (one of the top ten in the country). These buildings and the university departments associated with them serve as UIUC’s “neighborhoods,” and in them we can see the way a city’s tensions play out on a more micro scale. The examples I’ve given here are by no means exhaustive, but I believe they provide a taste of the unique experience of living in a college town.

Off campus, we have a perhaps more traditional, obvious example of hegemonic vs. vernacular cosmopolitanism: the two malls. First, in northern Champaign, there is the Market Place Mall, a traditional shopping center with stores like Bergner’s, JC Penney, Claire’s, Hot Topic, Kay Jewelers, etc. The fact that it is exactly the kind of mall you can find in most US towns makes it, much like Westfield Stratford City, as discussed by Georgiou, “mediated, controlled, commodified.” She says, “Westfield Stratford City is both indistinguishable from other spaces of global consumption and a very specific place…” (54) Indistinguishable though it may be from other places of this type, the Market Place Mall remains a destination for locals and people from the surrounding towns to shop, meet, and eat – much like any other mall.

The Lincoln Square Mall, in downtown Urbana, is much more vernacular in its cosmopolitanism. Aside from several empty storefronts, it is filled with local businesses and organizations including a small art supply store, an organic food co-op, a record shop, a church, and several martial arts/fitness studios. The few restaurants are locally owned – not a Panda Express or Auntie Anne’s Pretzels in sight. Unfortunately, it is clear that Lincoln Square does not benefit from attracting patrons from the surrounding towns in the way that Market Place does. This is not a mall that people go to just to hang out or browse. If you’re at Lincoln Square, it’s probably for a specific reason (the food co-op and the gym are the most popular destinations) and you aren’t likely to spend time just walking around the way you might at a more typical mall. However, it seems to keep itself afloat by engaging with the community. Events such as Pridefest are hosted there each year, and during the warmer months, you can visit the Urbana Farmers’ Market (another example of the vernacular) in the parking lot.

“...what most vividly characterizes the colonial city is its spatial segregation. Such separation is a powerful visual illustration of the ‘paradoxical unity’ of cities, where populations mingle on the streets and yet lead culturally separate lives” (Simon 2006, 22).

At the beginning of this essay, I alluded to the separation between students and townies. “Town-gown” relations are known to be troubled in many college towns, though some universities have taken steps to address the problem. Joshua J. Yates and Michaela Accardi studied this problem in 2019 and published their findings as the “Field Guide for Urban University-Community Partnerships.” While they identified ten universities with innovative community engagement programs (23), they also note that only 16 out of the 100 universities surveyed have a “governance structure inclusive of community members” (21). Regrettably, data for individual universities was not included in the guide, so I am uncertain of where the U of I falls in their evaluation. However, speaking from personal experience, I can say that I do not feel that the University encourages its students to engage with the Champaign/Urbana community. I did because I joined a mixed group soon after becoming a student there, so I straddled the line between students and townies for a long time. (I would say I went “full townie” after I left that group in 2015.) That said, the only time I was ever required to do community service (which is not, by any means, the end all be all of community engagement) was during my brief stint in the Air Force Reserve Officer Training Corps.

Price (2019), citing Abdelhafid Khatib, writes, “...social location and how you are identified matters in how you move, where you move, with what safety or danger, and that, in turn, has consequences for what you see and perceive” (76).

I’m going to get a bit political here and talk about 2016 and its aftermath. When the US presidential election took place, ending with the election of Donald Trump, Champaign/Urbana was a city divided (and you could hear it on local public radio the next morning). While it is, overall, a dot of blue in a sea of red (those are swapped from what they mean in Canada), the surrounding rural area’s influence can be seen outside of campus (as can the influence of the wealthy white Chicago suburbs that send students to UIUC). At the time, I was working for a local academic publisher and conference producer in what is called Research Park. Research Park is technically part of the U of I campus, though it is not near any residential or academic buildings. It houses both startups and branches of larger companies and is mainly tech-oriented. The company that I worked for skewed very millennial, female, and liberal, and the whole office took on a somber mood in the days following the election. That first day was a mess of tears, ranting, and not much work getting done. Our bosses made a point of checking in on how we were holding up. This was a place where everyone at least appeared to be on the same page, politically, and we all felt a little safer because of it. Personally, because I felt that visibility was important, I chose this time to start being a little more open about being a queer person, and I found it to be a non-issue among this set of coworkers.

Unfortunately, because there are plenty of things aside from politics that can make a job turn sour, I left that company towards the end of 2017 and had to head back to the retail world to make ends come anywhere near meeting. What I found there, in northern Champaign, near the Market Place Mall, was a world very different from the one in which I had been living for the past seven years. Though I wasn’t vocal about my political leanings, I didn’t lie about them either, and that earned me a fair amount of “jokes” and “teasing” (none of which seemed especially funny) from some of my superiors. They, in their positions of power over me, did not seem to understand why such behavior might be inappropriate, and it made more than one day at that job feel nearly like a hostile environment. It never escalated to a point where I felt like any potential retribution I might face was worth a report to Human Resources, but it was the closest I came to facing the urban/rural dichotomy of Champaign/Urbana head-on. By contrast with my publishing job, I did not feel safe outing myself as queer with the majority of these coworkers.

But then, by focusing on my own experience, I am still missing something. In his discussion of translation-as-tuning-in, Price talks about experience-near and experience-distant concepts. He explains, “If you try and reach for a person’s own schema, then you are focused on... ‘experience-near’ concepts; if you go for the abstract, disciplinary categories, and concepts foreign to what a social agent would recognize, then you are using ‘experience-distant’ concepts” (71).

It is one thing for me to recognize that a person of color or a disabled person or a trans person (especially one using a name and pronouns other than their legal ones) might have had an even more hostile experience at that retail workplace (and even, to an extent, at the predominantly white publishing company), and it is quite another for me to “tune in” to the everyday reality of such existences. I could say the same of my experiences as a student at the University. I felt safe there most of the time. How did my Latinx classmates feel when “Build the Wall” chalkings started appearing on campus in 2016 (including right outside of La Casa Cultural Latina - a deliberate act of intimidation)? How did my indigenous classmates feel when being asked to root for the “Fighting Illini?” (Illini refers to the Illinois Confederation, representing about a dozen indigenous tribes from the area [”The Illinois”].) Or when, nearly 15 years after the retirement of Chief Illiniwek (a “mascot” that involved a white student dressing in pseudo-ceremonial garb and performing a pseudo-ceremonial dance), local news outlets still stir up the debate on a regular basis via social media? What about the fact that Black people make up 16% of the population in Champaign/Urbana but the vast majority of arrests (yes, arrests) for jaywalking (88% in Champaign and 91% in Urbana) (Rosen 2012)?

Reaching for these experiences and trying to internalize them is something you might not expect a person from a small town to have any need to do, but, as I cited Cronin near the beginning of this post, the diversity that you see at the macro level also exists at the micro level. Champaign/Urbana has tensions between urban and rural, students and townies, racial tensions, gender disparities, and socio-economic divides, despite containing fewer than 150,000 people, compared to the millions in some of the biggest cities. College towns are their own unique animal with a double life unlike any other kind of city.

References

“309 Green.” 2020. Apartments Near UIUC | 309 Green | Champaign, IL. American Campus Communities. Accessed August 13, 2020. https://www.americancampus.com/student-apartments/il/champaign/309-green#amenities.

Cronin, Michael. 2006. “Translation and the New Cosmopolitanism.” In Translation and Identity, 6-40. London: Routledge.

Georgiou, Myria. 2014. “Consumption: The Hegemonic and the Vernacular.” In Media and the City: Cosmopolitanism and Difference, 44–65. Chichester: Polity Press.

Google Maps. Google. Accessed August 3, 2020. https://maps.google.com/.

Horgan, Mervyn. 2014. “Serendipitous City: In Search of Aleatory Urbanism.” In Cartographies of Place: Navigating the Urban, edited by Michael Darroch and Janine Marchessault, 55–76. Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press.

“The Illinois: Identity.” 2000. MuseumLink Illinois. Illinois State Museum. http://www.museum.state.il.us/muslink/nat_amer/post/htmls/il_id.html.

“Native Land.” n.d. Map. Native Land. Native Land Digital. Accessed August 3, 2020. https://native-land.ca/.

Ngo, Johnny. 2014. “Computer Science - Rise in Popularity and Plagiarism.” Uloop. Uloop Inc. October 5, 2014. https://www.uloop.com/news/view.php/138163/Computer-Science---Rise-in-Popularity-and-Plagiarism.

Price, Joshua Martin. 2019. “Taking Sides: Urban Wandering as a Decolonial Translation Practice in the Americas.” Tusaaji: A Translation Review 7 (1): 68–83. doi:10.25071/1925-5624.40385.

Rosen, Rebecca J. 2012. “In Champaign-Urbana, Illinois, 89% of Those Arrested for Jaywalking Are Black.” The Atlantic, August 24. https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/08/in-champaign-urbana-illinois-89-of-those-arrested-for-jaywalking-are-black/261522/.

Simon, Sherry. 2006. Translating Montreal: Episodes in the Life of a Divided City. Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press.

“UIUC Student Enrollment by Curriculum and Student Level Fall 2019.” 2019. University of Illinois Division of Management Information. September 9, 2019. https://www.dmi.illinois.edu/stuenr/class/enrfa19.htm.

U.S. Census Bureau. 2019. “U.S. Census Bureau QuickFacts: Champaign City, Illinois.” 2019. https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/urbanacityillinois.

U.S. Census Bureau. 2019. “U.S. Census Bureau QuickFacts: Urbana City, Illinois.” 2019. https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/champaigncityillinois.

Yates, Joshua J., and Michaela Accardi. 2019. Field Guide for Urban University-Community Partnerships. Charlottesville: Institute for Advanced Studies in Culture.

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sebastianreininger · 7 years

Text

The stone in his stomach jarred with each step over its brethren, entangled with every brush and twig that wrapped around his ankles as the thickets became more dense with each passing moment. He should have read their warning to slow his pace, to stop his progression, but the German’s thoughts were only on the stone in his stomach, the imagine possibility of what if something like this happened to Clarity, what if his close friend couldn’t find his brand lost in the middle of no where.

“We’ll find her.” It was the least he could think to say at all to comfort the tall man, as silence feel between them quickly as they moved. It wasn’t unlike Esme to be a man of few words, but Sebastian knew him better, that he wouldn’t keep his tongue still when someone he cared for was missing while they were on a frantic search. That’s what Sebastian chalked it up to: the brand and the nerves were a bad mixture and caused the strange behaviour that goaded him further.

“I’m sure she’s this way.”

Like the brand was a red string tied at their pinkies, and he was following it back to Alice. He trusted Clarity to keep herself safe-- her job and volunteered patrols were more dangerous than he knew she would admit, but the woman with a half century and more in age handled herself daily. Sebastian trusted her safety daily. He could only imagine the turmoil Esme was feeling, with a worried look to his face and a quick urgent pace in some direction. Some direction.

And the stone became heavier, sank deeper in his gut. Granted, they had only began their trudge in the dirt a few minutes prior, but it was odd all together Esme was leading them away from the collision, away from the damage, away from the supposed source of when Alice disappeared, the flames in the distance, like a setting sun that failed to ignite the sky, only the ground. But Esme had checked their home, searched for her among the debris, and he was sure she was in the dense of the forest?

“Warum sollte sie hier draußen sein?” “I’m sure she’s this way.”

And the weight turned and his stomach knotted with it. His long time business partner and friend always obliged when Sebastian slipped in and out of his native language, and the forcefulness of his assurance seemed more irritated than desperate, caught off guard without even answering the question. He wasn’t listening to his instincts, stifled and dismissed them as nerves of empathy for his closest friend, when they were first set on alert and had raised the hairs on the back of his neck when Esme seemingly appeared from the shadows and began his explanations instead of calling.

“Relax. Deine Freundin ist eine Hündin,” he smiled, getting close and jabbing the man with his elbow and a brighter temperament meant to ease “the worry”. “Wir werden sie finden, einen anderen Mann ficken. Wir können die Pferde auch ficken lassen. You don’t need to worry. They have so many patrolling the forest, we’ll probably run into meine Schlampe. She’ll want to get involved.”

“Yeah, I know. It’s just a bit further. We’ll get help later. I feel she’s close by.” What distance Sebastian had closed between them grew once more, as if he had made the other uncomfortable and more irritated, when the shorter of the men deserved a slap upside his head, if not a solid hook in the jaw. Or a question for the crude language that would never pass his lips otherwise. The smile faded from the human’s face, head lifted higher as he purposely kept his pace to be near the imposter, who turned to him with a furrowed brow rather common to Esme’s true face, but rarely shown towards him. Shapeshifters, magic, a drug that Sebastian that made him see illusions and be convinced of its verity-- it didn’t matter what was misleading him, but the German wasn’t a fool.

“And look who’s calling. I should tell her where we are, ja?”

The flatness of his voice told he was no longer in the charade, and although he reached for the phone before he spoke, the screen lit up only when his fingers were able to wrap around the buttons. Any idiot could tell there was no vibration that would have caught his attention no picture or alert visible to suggest someone was calling no matter how Sebastian attempted to angle the phone from revealing it. He locked eyes with his supposed friend, as his finger pressed the quick dial contact as if he was answering the fake call. Both of their faces were barren of emotion, an unannounced staring contest and acknowledgement: they both knew the other’s lie, they both knew when Sebastian put the phone to his ear, no incoming call would light up the other man’s pocket. The question was: what would happen next?

Sebastian’s free hand was already reaching for his gun tucked away in his pants before the first ring failed to connect to any phone in the vicinity, while the fake Esme was raising his hands too. To fight, to subdue, to do worse than Sebastian’s imagination knew was possible, his phone was tossed amid the commotion, still ringing lost in the grass while the men struggled. He clutched his weapon tightly, attempting to direct it anywhere a bullet could do any damage but the grip around his wrist forced his aim off in the trees. The jab of knuckles at his chest was enough to knock the wind from them, but it didn’t deter him from clutching at the not-Esme’s arm to pull him closer.

Keep him close. It was the only way Sebastian knew how to handle the repeated blows to his side and stomach because distance would mean error, the chance for this man to get an edge. Sebastian’s eyes darted between him and the environment, searching for something, anything or anyone that could help. Even if this man had friends to help him cart Sebastian off, fighting two people had its advantages over one. But the trickster caught on to an idea of what Sebastian was thinking, and the laughter that bubbled from his lips was velvet and deep, despite the harsh and staggered breathing of the struggle.

“She’s not coming.”

Once more the German’s gaze locked onto the other’s, but it was flat and devoid conscious. His focus no longer became angle, but height, forcing the aim of his gun in the air still, but next to his assailant's ear where the first shot went off. As the faux Esme retreated to tend to his injured hearing, Sebastian realigned to his forehead.

The body fell lopsided, and he watched the illusion fade to his true face with a dark and bleeding hole above one of the eyes. And he watched, and didn’t move, like this was a trick and Sebastian was ready for the jump to shoot him again. It never came, though he didn’t know how long he waited for it to come. When his senses came back to him, he knew he should get back, tell someone of what happened, get information to stop it from reoccurring.

He bent to knee and raided the man’s pockets, hoping to find anything of value. When his fingers glided around the plastic of a phone there was hope, but it never withdrew from its hiding place. Sebastian doubled over, trying to breathe through the pain shooting through his chest, cutting in his lungs, vibrating in his ribs. What breath he did take was with heaves, though they became stifled the more he hunched over, putting his head into the ground as sweat broke and began to bead on his features. He couldn’t outsmart this pain, but he couldn’t find the source either, without a physical wound to his person and no culprit in sight.

Time seemed to have abandoned him to agony, but then befriend him in a reprieve that dulled the pain, and then numbed it to memory. Sebastian staggered to his feet, attempting to feel for wounds that hadn’t occurred to him, but another. It was his turn to tug on the red cord, follow the line with his thoughts only on one.

Clarity.

#echohq:event #tw guns #tw foul language

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aureate-priest-blog · 8 years

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Sandman’s Bio :0

I FINALLY FINISHED THIS STUPID THING;; im just gonna put this here because Google docs is messing up :(

Name: Tanz Nachtmann

Nickname: “Sandman”

Meaning of name: “Dance” (Tanz) “Night Man” (Nachtmann)

Origin of name: Germany

Age: 26

Sex: Male

Blood type: O+

Nationality: German

Ethnicity: Caucasian

Political Party: Independent

Socioeconomic level as a child: Working Poor

Socioeconomic level as an adult: Upper Middle

Birthdate: November 9th, 1990

Birthplace: Germany

Current residence: Soho, Lower Manhattan / NYC

Hobbies/Pastimes: Painting, Reading (Mostly about non-fictional events and history)

Talents/Skills: Singing, Painting

Birth order: Third, Middle Child

Family:

Therese Nachtmann (Mother, deceased)

Bruno Nachtmann (Father, alive, imprisoned)

Alvin Streisgund (Stepfather, deceased)

Lothar Nachtmann (Eldest brother, alive, imprisoned)

Alfons Nachtmann (Older brother, deceased)

Judith Nachtmann (Younger sister, deceased)

Erica Nachtmann (Youngest sister, deceased)

Hometown: Friedrichshain, Berlin, Germany

Most important childhood event that still affects him/her: The murder of his mother, stepfather, older brother, and younger sisters.

Favorite parent: His stepfather, Alvin

Why?: To him, Alvin was more than just his stepfather. He was his best friend, and if needed, his therapist. Alvin got him into exercising his anger into artistic forms of either drawing, painting, or singing, and almost always was able to convince Tanz to settle down before his temper erupted; thus, Alvin helped him avoid conflict with his mother whenever she was in an ill mood, or if she were drunk out of her mind.

Biggest role model: Jack the Ripper

Why?: While reading about psychology and the 19th century, Tanz happened across a name that caught his eye quicker than a flash. Tanz was infatuated with this infamous figure, for the fact that they were never caught for any of their murders, and avoided any contact with the public or the press. It, in a twisted sense, inspired Tanz’s art to span out in multiple directions, as well as push him to divert down craftier routes in skiving out of trouble, evolving his personality drastically.

Height: 6’6”

Weight: 195 lbs

Posture: Tanz keeps a very rigid and upright posture

Build: Little fat and muscle, round and narrow shoulders, slim neck and waist, long arms and legs

Skin: Smooth and fair colored

Hair: Dark brown, almost always slicked back

Ears: Small and round

Eyes: Amber, usually narrowed

Nose: Long and angled, slightly crooked

Mouth: Thin upper and bottom lips, easily curved into a smile

Face shape: Gaunt and elongated

Expressions: Either smug or blank

Describe their smile: His “people-person” smile has a softer tone to it and is quite natural, however his smile can stretch quite wide, making it look rather freakish in a trick of the light, and especially when he smiles with his teeth

Hands: Average sized hands with long, nimble fingers

Feet: Average sized feet

Left/Right handed?: Left

Distinguishing features: Mainly his bright eyes that compliment his often sly smile

Who does s/he take after: More of his mother’s sharp, angular sides than his father’s rounder features

How does s/he dress: His casual everyday fashion consists of either long sleeve sweaters or hoodies, and black skinny jeans or leggings. Shoe wise, he wears white Vans and occasionally mixes it up with some black high-tops. For different seasonal situations he wears bomber jackets and scarves, and perhaps some gloves depending on how cold it is out.

Weapons: They differ on the situation he’s in, but normally he carries around a knife hidden at his hip

Are they generally balanced or clumsy?: In his youth, he was perceived as awfully clumsy, however through dedication and interest in precision, he grew more balanced over time

Mannerisms/Poses/Movement: Tanz’s unruly upbringing in his ragtag apartment for six lead him to having absolutely no manners or common sense, and over time he started to realize that perhaps acting like a child wouldn’t get him anywhere. He learned different forms of etiquette for all sorts of events, and it slowly changed the way he held himself in front of any person of any socioeconomic class; be it the president or a stranger in a store.

Describe their walk: Tanz tends to have a constricted walk as rigid as his posture, as though he were marching in the army; although, when running, he breaks into a full, fluid sprinting motion as seamless as air.

Habits/OCDs/Obsessions: Tanz has a nasty habit of tearing the skin off his fingers with his teeth, though it isn’t due to anxiety, and more or less it’s something he finds himself doing without knowing.

Health: Quite deteriorated, not so good

Hygiene: Keeps himself spick and span all the time

Speech Patterns: Mostly speaks with loads of diction, and he tends to drag some words and sentences out when talking to people he has a disliking for

Voice: Tanz’s voice is slightly of higher pitch with a sense of mocking put subtlety in. His German accent is noticeable, but not thick enough to a point of obscurity.

Describe their laugh: Normally he tries to keep his composure so he won't laugh, because if he does it sounds like a rabid hyena

Style (Elegant, shabby, etc): More on the elegant side

Known Languages: German, English

Character's long-term goals/desires in life: Finding someone he can really connect with and settling down with them, and if that person turns up unhappy in the relationship, he would dispose them.

How self-confident is the character?: He has a jarring lack of self-confidence

How do they see him/herself?: Tanz sees himself as a normal human being, who can’t seem to understand why people think murder is so wrong when they deserve it

What is the character most proud of?: His success in getting massive amounts of money from his one-night stands’ bank accounts and using their emotional heartbreaks to his advantage

What does the character like least about themselves?: Tanz dislikes his physical features, and the way he does things, often cursing at himself in fits of blind rage that sometimes lead to unwarranted self harm

How do they express themselves?: FINGER PAINTING!!!! (Unfortunately, the red he finger paints with is not paint)

Patience level (on a level of 1 to 10?): Around a 7/10, depending on what he’s impatient for. If it’s something he deems “urgent” then it’s most likely a 2/10.

Does the character seem ruled by emotion or logic or some combination thereof?: He seems ruled by a combination of the two, but emotion plays a bigger part

Most at ease when: Any of his “friends” are done and dealt with, and when it rains

Ill at ease when: People begin to get a bit antsy and suspicious with him, and in crowds

Describe their sense of humor: Tanz’s humor is awfully dark, and most people tend to avoid discussing emotional or horrifying topics around him in fear they’ll be entreated to a joke about a dead loved one

If granted one wish, what would it be?: To be born and raised in a better family

Why?: Tanz has created a deep hatred for both his mother and father, as well as his siblings, for his crude childhood and half-assed education and meals. Sometimes he still wishes he got to live far away with his stepfather, though it was a dream crushed to bits as he watched his stepfather plead for his life as he was murdered before his eyes.

Character/Personality/Mental/Social: His strength lies in himself, and though he has such a lack of confidence, he only ever relies on what he does in that moment, and no one else. While good with influencing people and manipulating them, he often finds it difficult to connect with them on an empathetic level, with the way his mind is fractured into believing different ethical actions

If they could be described with one of the seven virtues, which would it be?: Diligence

If they could be described with one of the seven sins, which would it be?: Wrath

Biggest Vulnerability (non physical): Anything mentioning his parents in a negative way would set him off, or even praising his parents (i.e.: “Ah, I feel sorry for you mother, she must have been a great person.”)

Optimist or Pessimist: Optimistic

Introvert or extrovert: Despite his lack of empathy, Tanz is more on the extroverted spectrum due to him engaging with people often in order to befriend them and gain their trust

Favorite

Color: Red

Place: The Ocean

Room in the house and why: Bedroom, because there he feels like that it’s his own personal space and that no one else may break peace there

Food/drinks: Butter cookies, root beer

Music genre: 80s New Wave

Songs and Singers/Bands: The Cure, Depeche Mode, Rammstein, Megaherz

Movies/Tv Shows/Performances: Phantom of the Opera, any detective/homicide show

Books: Grimms’ Fairy Tales, Blood Meridian

Historical figure: Jack the Ripper

Subject in school: Art

Animal: Snake

Least Favorite

Place: City (Even though he lives there, he mainly fights against his dislike for the sake of what victims he pursues)

Food/drink: Steak, any meat in general really, and tea

Music genre: Country, and pop music

Subject in school: P.E. / Gym

Where does this character like to hang out?: Anywhere near large bodies of water

Where is this character's dream place to live?: On or near the beach

Mode of transportation: He regularly tends to walk everywhere, or hitch a ride from someone if he gets to know them

Girlfriend/Boyfriend(s): He never has had any, as he fears these would get in his way, and lead to some suspicion towards him if loved ones knew about the relationship after a murder

Marital status: Single

What kind of person would s/he consider to be the perfect partner?: Though hopping from one victim to another, Tanz does often think of settling down with someone, even if his intention is to murder them after a few months or so. The kind of person he’d consider to be perfect is someone who’s simple, and unnecessarily nice and loving. Perhaps he’d even want more of an obsessive partner that thought about him non-stop, so that killing them would make it easier.

Is the character judgmental of others and how so?: Tanz is extremely judgemental about others and chooses what he wants to “befriend” wisely. He detests those who drink abhorrent amounts of alcohol and have an annoyingly high sex drive. He judges how they walk, how they dress, how often they blink, and even the slight pauses in between their sentences to pick apart who they really are inside. When it comes to people he loathes, he tends to even degrade and belittle them for every miniscule thing, making him an overall petty person.

How do they treat members of the opposite sex?: He knows not at all women are bad based on the actions of just his mother and sisters, so he tries to treat them as respectfully as he would with any person. When it comes to romance however, he doesn’t find that much of an interest in them; although, he will choose them for a “one-night stand” just for the sole purpose of killing them, rather than men in which he’ll portray sexual interest in.

What do they consider to be a romantic setting/activity/date?: Tanz’s favorite romantic settings have everything to do with the lighting. Anything with a soft, warm hue in a place simply screams “romance” to him. Most activities he considers romantic are going out to dinner at nice places, or visiting museums or local parks. He’ll go anywhere for his date that he needs to in order to make them feel comfortable with him and their surroundings, so that a more trusting interaction takes place.

How does a normal date go for this character?: Dates usually go well and smooth for Tanz, and on the rare occasion, there’s always someone who doesn’t quite agree, and that ends up violent with a body in the back alley.

Virgin?: Nope

How often does this character have sex?: Not too often unless his “date” really thinks that would make their friendly interactions progress

How long can he/she go without sex?: For a long, long time

How does this character feel emotionally, after sex?: Bored, really. Tanz doesn’t find much pleasure in having intercourse with another person, so often times he would avoid sex as much as possible, as it’s a total buzzkill for him.

Usually on the top or bottom?: Top

Dominant or Submissive?: Dominant

What song best fits this character?: There are a few songs I had in mind!!! :D

Mr. Sandman by The Chordettes (Of course!)

Tanzdiktator by Nachtmahr

Disappoint by Assemblage 23

Politikil by ohGr

Why Can’t I Be You? by The Cure

#ocs #i cried a bit #there was too much information so some of it i had to cut out

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